


our mercy is a boundary we'll surrender

by Plooby



Series: and as we fall we sing [8]
Category: Dragon Age: Origins, Dragon Age: Origins - Awakening
Genre: (No he isn't), Anal Sex, Canon-Typical Violence, Loss of Virginity, M/M, Oral Sex, Taerahel Surana, Threesome - M/M/M, Walking In On Someone, alistair is so done with these gays, imagination adventures about dragon age ocs, political intrigue? in MY erotic fanfiction? it's more likely than you think, taerahel if you murder everyone who's ever rude to zevran you're never going to get anything done
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-18
Updated: 2020-10-18
Packaged: 2021-03-08 22:35:24
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 34,464
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27084223
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Plooby/pseuds/Plooby
Summary: Months after the Battle of Denerim, Taerahel Surana is living with Zevran at the royal palace, looking out for the welfare of the newly-crowned King Alistair and that of the city's elves (and ignoring increasingly insistent letters from both Weisshaupt and Amaranthine). But a chance discovery raises questions about whether such a comfortable new life can last.
Relationships: Alistair/Zevran Arainai/Male Surana, Zevran Arainai/Male Surana
Series: and as we fall we sing [8]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1790470
Comments: 7
Kudos: 10





	1. Poison

"And I spoke to Valendrian on your behalf this afternoon," Taerahel concluded. "Don't worry, he quite understood when I told him you were still at the bann's mercy today." Alistair laughed ruefully, and Taerahel smiled, tucking his feet up under him. "He didn't need much, anyway. Just apparently a band of no-account third cousins of some noble house have decided to rebuke his court appointment by sneaking in and trying to start fires. They haven't managed to do much damage so far, but they're also quite persistent. Zevran and I will take care of it in a way of which you can truthfully disavow all knowledge."

"Yes, thank you." Alistair sighed, and took a sip of his whiskey. With the day over, he was sprawled on the couch in the sitting room of his chambers with boots kicked off and outer doublet half-undone, and actually looked almost like he felt himself again. "At least you should be able to shut it down before anyone's hurt. Well, anyone who doesn't deserve it. But the alienage is all right otherwise?"

"Relatively speaking, yes. The new employer regulations are actually very much appreciated, from what I hear." Taerahel tilted his head, to lean it on a hand propped up by the side of his own armchair. "And things wrapped up all right with the bann's entourage, since I mentioned it?"

Alistair snorted, though it was mild enough. "Fine. Three days of posturing and he's on his way back to the Southern Bannorn, and good riddance. I'm not even sure I completely understand what he wanted, but I think at least he thinks he got it." Taerahel smiled, picking up his own wineglass again, even as Alistair was glancing his way. "Why, was there something in particular you were interested in?"

"No, I was only curious. It did strike me a bit odd that he came all this way and didn't even stay long enough to have his own estate ready, but it sounds like he just wanted to beat his chest at you, and couldn't work out how to put that in a letter." He finished the dregs, and then made a soft sound even as he was swallowing, one last thought occurring. "Oh, and I almost forgot. Zevran caught a girl in the kitchens with poison this morning."

Alistair blinked at him a moment, and then his expression landed somewhere between incredulous and amused. "Really? That's the sort of thing that just slips your mind these days?"

"Well, it wasn't much of an attempt," Taerahel said, shrugging as he leaned over to set down his empty glass. "He said he was passing through to go out the servants' entrance, and immediately noticed one of the maids acting very jumpy when he passed by. He spent a while charming her until he could get at the pocket of her apron, and then the vial was just inside." He paused there, thinking back. "She was elven, apparently, so the odds of a personal grudge are relatively low, if I do say so. But anyone who put her up to it couldn't have known what they were doing, either."

"I suppose really clumsy would-be murderers are better than the alternative." Alistair took another swig of whiskey, and then gave Taerahel a curiously tentative, if half-humorous look. "It... really doesn't bother you, when he does that?"

Taerahel was the one to frown at him this time. "Does what?"

"You know..." Alistair's gaze turned elsewhere a moment, his expression uncomfortable. "When he -- flirts with serving girls, and things like that?"

"To keep you from being poisoned?" Taerahel asked, eyebrow raised and amused. "I think I'll let it slide." Alistair looked for a moment like he might want to continue that line of discussion, but after appearing to think of and then discard a few different things to say, just returned to the previous subject with awkward obviousness.

"What, ah, did he do with her, then?"

"She's in a cell for now; it doesn't seem likely that she knows anything, though. Or that the poison itself will be much more help, although Zevran did send it to the court alchemist to be analyzed. The results should come back directly to you, for what it's worth. 'That certainly is poison,' I would expect." Alistair laughed, and Taerahel smiled slightly. "We should probably discuss a taster, at some point. I'm surprised it's the first time this has come up."

"It's so nice to be popular," Alistair said dryly, and Taerahel smiled.

"Look at it this way. If terrible people want to kill you, at least you know you're doing a good job."

Alistair appeared to consider that for a moment, and then shrugged. "I suppose that is reassuring, as long as they _don't_ kill me. Although you two do seem to be doing very well at things you can't tell me about to prevent that." Taerahel nodded acknowledgment, with a broader smile still, and Alistair rubbed a hand over his face with his exhale loud against it. "Why did you have to go and make me king, anyway?"

"Because you asked me to," Taerahel said, promptly, with all good cheer. It had become a familiar enough exchange over the past months to proceed by rote. "Also because if you weren't king, you couldn't give me the other casks of that Storm Age Montsimmard red in the cellars that I'm in love with."

That won him a truculent squint from under Alistair's palm, although there was a laugh in his eyes. "What makes you think I'm going to give them to you anyway?"

Taerahel smiled at him, extremely sweetly. "Because I'm very charming, and you don't care for Orlesian vintages anyway, and I save your life frequently, and I want them."

Alistair grunted, and dropped his hand away with a noisy sigh. " _Fine_... fine, I'll tell the steward. Extortionist." Taerahel beamed his pleasure, and Alistair's look back at him was grudgingly amused. "Was there anything else I should know about?"

"Not that I can think of. But I'll let you know if anything comes up." Taking the cue, Taerahel untucked himself from his fold in the chair and got to his feet, smoothing down his clothing. "Leliana says hello, by the way. I had a letter."

Alistair looked up at him, surprised. "She writes to you? She doesn't write to me."

"This is the first time," Taerahel said, with a bit of an apologetic smile. "Also, given the sorts of things she's doing in Orlais, I imagine she also thinks the king of Ferelden would rather be able to say he doesn't know anything about them."

"Nobody can tell me anything anymore," Alistair grumbled. "Maybe I just need to get better at forgetting things. Tell her hello from me as well, anyway. And Zevran, I haven't seen much of him lately."

"I will. Get some rest?"

"We'll see." Alistair half-smiled at him, ruefully. "Good night."

Taerahel gave Revas a scratch behind the ears on his way out, when he passed by the spot in the foyer where the mabari dozed in a dramatic flop on his side, and won a frenzy of stubby tail-wagging for his efforts. It was still pleasant to see him on these evening visits, even if he seemed to have reattached himself much more to Alistair these days, and probably so much the better. Taerahel would never have understated Revas's value, but to be honest he'd always been more of a cat person.

Once he'd straightened up, he let himself back out into the corridors, but then found himself lingering as he made his way back to the more modest suite he shared with Zevran, making the trip take some time even though (by mutual agreement) they resided quite close to the royal suite. Thinking things over. Alistair might complain, and no doubt would continue to, but he had applied himself to his new responsibilities with a determination that rather impressed Taerahel -- and at the same time, it had now also begun to concern him. It did wear on Alistair, plainly, however he might try to laugh it off, and there seemed to be very little in his life these days to distract him from it in the bargain. He could probably use a holiday, although that seemed like an extreme unlikelihood under the circumstances. Perhaps it was time to consult with Zevran on the best practice of kidnapping.

He did think sometimes how curious it was that he'd wound up staying at Alistair's side in particular, after all of it. They were friends now, certainly, but there'd been a significant time when he would have ranked Alistair near the bottom of the companions he was closest to. Not at the bottom, of course: he'd never really been able to see eye-to-eye with Morrigan, even though their relationship had taken some... interesting turns at times; and Wynne had been such a familiar sort of presence that it had been easy to fall back into the rhythms of playing the perfect apprentice and telling her exactly what she wanted to hear, even while he still didn't think she had ever for a second trusted him as far as she could throw him. Honestly, apart from Zevran, the only person he could have said he'd been really close to most of the time had been Sten -- whom he still missed keenly almost every day. Sten had just made so much _sense_ , and so much of it in completely unexpected ways, that if not for the issue of magic, Taerahel might have been somewhat tempted by his Qun.

But as for him and Alistair, they had been particularly slow to warm to each other: he had at first found Alistair foolish and tiresome, and he knew full well Alistair had thought him ruthless and self-important and untrustworthy -- and not wrongly so, at the time. Retrieving the Ashes to where Alistair had waited at Arl Eamon's bedside had seemed to go a ways toward raising Taerahel in his estimation, though, and they had come to talk much more afterward, as well as being staunchly united in purpose when it came to defying the templars and saving the Circle. Gradually, to his chagrin, Taerahel had come to see that he had fallen into an extremely common trap of underestimating Alistair, in spite of all his certainty of his own exceptional cleverness. It wasn't that Alistair was putting on an act, or anything like that, but on examination his hilarity turned out to be tempered by a remarkable capacity for loyalty and courage, a strong sense of justice, and a surprisingly keen awareness of how little the world around him actually shared those virtues. He simply refused to allow it to turn into cynicism, which was remarkable in itself, really. In context, Taerahel could see how such a person might shield himself with jokes, just to survive his constant disappointment.

Even so, cleaving himself to Alistair in the long term might have seemed like an unlikely choice to start. But even after his inquiries through Valendrian had revealed that Revaia Surana had passed away of a wasting sickness some eight years past, only a few years after she had given her son up to the templars, Taerahel still found himself feeling strangely responsible for Denerim's alienage -- in spite of having only the occasional eerie sense of childhood deja vu to connect him to it now. And if the role he had taken on here with Zevran at his side had come to actually be quite enjoyable (increasingly annoyed letters from the seneschal of Vigil's Keep notwithstanding), and Alistair's company a large part of that enjoyment, then that was a worthwhile prize, and for no more cost than worrying Alistair would fret himself onto his pyre before any of the capital's highborn malcontents could even get a chance to put him there.

Thinking of feeling responsible for the alienage, though, they'd better start keeping watch tonight if they were to catch the idiots at it. Taerahel shook aside the rest of his thoughts, and took his last turning to their rooms.

\---

As it turned out, however, the arsonists didn't make another attempt for some days yet. Taerahel and Zevran roamed all through the shadows of the alienage's quietest and darkest spaces, dressed for stealth, but the waiting was exceptionally boring for the first two nights. On the third, however, Zevran finally spotted a set of poorly-disguised figures using the reconstruction scaffolding to clamber over the north wall. Petty and violent the little band might have been, but they certainly didn't make it up in skills of observation: Taerahel was able to await them on the ground until they climbed down almost close enough to touch, and they never even noticed him until the spell of paralysis had already settled over them all.

Then it was a simple enough matter for Zevran to put a knife at the leader's throat and explain to them, in the most light, pleasant, and conversational of tones, why setting fire to the homes of people who couldn't defend themselves really wasn't the best way to express their political displeasure. Once or twice, for punctuation, he even gave a sudden turn of his wrist and deliberately nicked the fool across the skin of the throat, just enough to spill a little blood and make him think, for a second, that the end had come -- with no way to even express his terror but for his labored breath to heave faster. Taerahel just stood under the scaffolding holding his concentration around the men, and let a fond smile creep through now and then as he watched. He didn't think he'd ever get tired of it.

When Zevran was finally satisfied he'd made his point, he gave Taerahel a nod, and Taerahel lifted the paralysis. Most of the intruders wasted no time at all in scrambling, with satisfying cries of panic, back up the way they'd come, practically stepping on each other here and there in the process. One bringing up the rear, though, was either angry enough or fool enough or both to hike up his crossbow for a last shot at Zevran's turning back -- but before it could fire, Taerahel had already raised his staff again, and the crushing force that clamped itself around the man's body and lifted it clean off the ground both made him drop his bow, and snapped at least a good five of his ribs inside his body, by the sounds. He ended in a shuddering, moaning heap on the dirty cobbles, not even able to limp back toward the scaffolding and certainly not able to climb it to escape. Taerahel and Zevran hardly needed to confer before agreeing to just leave him there, disarmed, for whichever of the alienage's residents found him first to do what they liked with him. Taerahel even took the helpful measure of carving a prettily scrolled little drawing of a dancing flame into the back of the man's hand with one of Zevran's knives, unmindful of the screaming, just to clarify the matter. He was actually quite good at drawing, which Zevran had been delighted to learn and always enjoyed seeing shown off.

The guard at the gate ushered them back into the city proper with a knowing nod, and Taerahel dropped the crossbow in a pile of rubbish at the edge of the market district, before linking his hand into Zevran's for a while as they strolled back along the side streets. He was in a fine mood, and saw no need to hurry; it was still early on a pleasant night, he was with his beloved, they'd just finished some satisfying work, and there were some lovely wine-casks waiting for them back home, for that matter.

So it was a reasonable progression that by some hour or two later, they had found their way to being naked in the wrecked disarray of their oversized bed, Zevran sprawled on his back amid the sheets and clutching in Taerahel atop him at arse and back, Taerahel grinding on his buried cock with a similar luxurious lack of haste. The warm evening had them both lightly dewed with sweat, and Taerahel's hair hung over his shoulder in a waving curtain as he drank in Zevran's hungry gaze on him, following every arch and twist of his body. In no hurry to be anywhere but exactly where he was, just yet.

He would have completely ignored the knock at the outer door of the suite, of course, if it hadn't been immediately followed by Alistair's voice -- distant, but not as much as it would have been if he'd still been outside the suite entirely. They never stood on much ceremony with each other these days.. "Taerahel? Are you still up?"

"Yes, I am," Taerahel called back, over his shoulder, loud enough to make himself heard -- too distracted with the flush of pleasure all through him to really consider the action. Zevran snorted a little laugh, stroking a deliberate hand up Taerahel's hard cock to underscore the joke, and Taerahel's breath hitched pleasantly even as he grinned back. "Just -- "

Too late, though. The bedroom door pushed open, Alistair's voice coming from the other side of it already before the wood had moved aside enough to let it come clear. "I know it's late, but the alchemist just sent baaaaaaaaa _aaaaaaaaaa_... aa."

Ah. Well. These things happened.

Taerahel didn't even bother to to slow the rhythm of his hips working Zevran into him as he twisted back a bit, with a breathless smile, to meet Alistair's fixed huge eyes in the apoplectic red of his face in the doorway. He couldn't seem to move or even breathe yet, turned into a human statue by the fullest possible view of Taerahel riding Zevran's cock in earnest, his own hardness clearly grasped in Zevran's hand.

"Sorry, could you give us just a bit?" Taerahel said, beaming and polite and heavy with breath, and that seemed to bring Alistair back to life about as gently as if he'd shot a bolt of lightning instead. Alistair jumped so badly he stumbled, and then he was gabbling even while he was tripping over himself to escape.

"Sorry -- very -- I'll -- sorry -- yes -- that," he said, approximately, in the process of nearly hitting himself in the face with the door as he staggered out of it and closed it firmly behind him again. Taerahel looked at the blank plane of wood, and then back at Zevran, who was looking back up at him with very raised eyebrows... and then he was covering his mouth and Zevran turning his face into the nearest pillow, to both desperately muffle an outburst of laughter.

"You could have mentioned we were planning to kill him," Zevran said low when he could manage it, and Taerahel laughed harder into his hand, at least briefly holding still on top of Zevran's hips as he tried to get a hold of himself. "Or would that have spoiled the surprise?"

"I didn't _say_ 'come in,'" he pointed out in nearly a whisper, half-muffled into his fingers, and Zevran pressed his lips tight on another snort of laughter. When that last burst had passed for both of them, though, Taerahel did shift his hips again, drawing from Zevran both an uneven sigh and a renewed squeeze at his cock that made Taerahel make a soft sound. "Well, at least I can heal any damage. Later."

"Later," Zevran agreed, a bit of velvety mischief curled around the edges as his hand made its way back to a lazy stroking rhythm. "After all, depending on how noisy you are, there may be damage left to do."

Taerahel couldn't help laughing again at that, although he kept grinding on Zevran's cock and into his hand all the while, suspended between pleasure and more pleasure. And choosing not to dwell on how often the same image recurred to him, all the while that he was drawing closer and closer to coming, even as he enjoyed as much as ever Zevran's intense half-lidded gaze and murmured filthy endearments: that of Alistair's huge shocked gaze, frozen on the sight of them both.

He spilled gasping over Zevran's fingers at last, his hips jutting and shuddering on top of Zevran's, When he'd panted and shivered out the end of it, Zevran pulled himself gently out to keep from pushing past the point of unpleasantness, and Taerahel was only too happy to grind obscenely back against Zevran's working hand and cock after and help drive him also to his peak. It came quickly enough, in a stutter of gasping and sound, and a hot wetness laced up the curve of Taerahel's arse and lower back. He reveled in that feeling a moment as he only stayed where he was propped, hovering over Zevran as he caught his breath and swallowed, and then lowered himself clumsily into the welcoming curl of Zevran's arm. They breathed together for a little while, foreheads close and both slick with sweat, comfortable in the quiet that had fallen.

Eventually, though, Taerahel stirred, making a weary little sound in his throat. "I don't think I ever heard Alistair leave," he murmured, in a slightly scratchy voice. "I ought to go make sure he isn't passed out on the sitting room floor, I suppose."

"At least fetch a pillow for the poor man," Zevran agreed, with a grin that Taerahel answered, and then kissed. Zevran caught him closer for a moment to prolong it, pushing past a quick brush to a tender thoroughness that he looked slightly uncertain about afterward. He always looked the least sure of himself in moments like that, when he'd wanted to simply kiss or hold Taerahel for its own sake, and like always it tugged at the inside of Taerahel's chest so much that he had to kiss Zevran again, just to make sure the point was made.

Finally he did manage to get himself out of bed, however, and make his way wincing to the wash-basin to clean up his rear as best he could. He only bothered to wrap in a thin, draping silk robe in a lovely peacock hue (his favorite, acquired for him by Zevran through dubious means), before letting himself out of the bedroom; these were their own rooms, after all. And Alistair, possibly to his credit, was indeed still there: sitting stiff-spined on the edge of an armchair against the far wall, with an expression that could best be described as "mildly poleaxed."

"The alchemist sent a reply about that poison?" Taerahel asked, prompting, and plucked a discarded bit of cord off a side-table to tie up his hair with as he came in. He'd been letting it grow largely out of spite ever since he'd first left the watchful eyes of the enchanters who'd always frowned at him about it, and by now the tumble of it reached mid-back. Alistair looked at him in sheer alarm for a few seconds, before clearing his throat more than seemed necessary.

"Oh, he, ah... it..." He appeared to lose his thread there, briefly, and then just collected himself with a deep breath, setting his palms on his thighs with a new air of determination. "Look, I am... very sorry. That was careless, and -- rude, and. I should be more careful about your privacy, and. Knocking. And that sort of thing."

"Don't worry, it's fine," Taerahel said, waving it aside with no more interest than mild amusement. "No harm done. What did he have to say? Did he find anything after all?"

Alistair fumbled for the thread a moment, and then with a bit of blinking he managed to follow it. "Oh, um -- yes. Yes, actually." He cleared his throat again. "Yes, apparently it's actually something that he could recognize because it's very rare. I can't say I understood all of it, but the part I did get is that it's usually used by the Antivan Crows."

Taerahel frowned, arrested in mid-step in front of Alistair's chair. "The Crows? Really?"

"Yes, he was quite clear on that point. It's made from the venom of some snake that lives in Antiva, supposedly? They -- "

"Oh, yes!" Zevran's voice came brightly from over Taerahel's shoulder, coming up behind him. "Marvelous stuff. It thins the blood, you see, and looses it from the flesh, so that the victim dies bleeding from the mouth, and eyes, and skin. Quite fascinating to watch, if a terrible nuisance to clean up after."

Alistair had frozen temporarily when Zevran came up alongside, and by the time Zevran was nearly finished speaking he was red again and spluttering. "You -- could you -- Maker, would you put something on, please?"

Taerahel glanced over, amused in spite of himself, at where Zevran was still indeed entirely and quite enjoyably nude. For his part, Zevran only blinked at Alistair, all mock-frowning perplexity as he settled a warm hand low on Taerahel's back. "And be so cruel as to deny you both the view?"

"I don't suppose it was your impression that the maid carrying it might have been a Crow?" Taerahel asked Zevran, while he was there, electing to remain focused rather than acknowledge any of this beyond a suppressed smile. Zevran laughed, which probably would have been answer enough in itself.

"Unless she was by far the most accomplished actor I have ever encountered among our number, and playing at incompetence for no reason I can discern? Then no." He considered a moment, and most likely drew the moment out deliberately for the maximum pleasure of Alistair's discomfiture. Alistair had his hand fully over his eyes by now, for his part. "It might have been granted her by an employer who had means to acquire such a thing, however. It is regrettably common to assume a fine tool will somehow improve the hand that wields it."

"It might be worth speaking to her after all," Taerahel said, nodding, and glanced back at Alistair as he did so. "Would you let the guards know I'd like to visit the dungeon tomorrow?"

"Of course," Alistair said. He even took his hand away from his eyes, although he stared firmly at the floor after making the mistake of glancing up. "Just you, or both of you? I don't suppose Zevran will be wearing trousers by then?"

"Likely, but I wouldn't wish to ruin the suspense," Zevran said, cheerfully. Taerahel ignored both of them again, thinking instead.

"Just me, I think. Less threatening that way."

That did seem to wilt a touch of the humor out of Zevran's face, though, and he looked back at Taerahel with a lightness that didn't quite disguise his hesitation. "Are you certain? It would be no trouble to accompany you."

Taerahel smirked, and turned fully to face Zevran, extending his hand as though in introduction. "Perhaps we have not met -- I'm known as the Hero of Ferelden, largely for defeating an Archdemon, which was very well known for being considerably larger and more formidable than the average household maidservant."

"Ah, I love this game!" Zevran said with all evidence of delight restored, clasping Taerahel's hand back and making his mouth twitch again. "Tell me, am I the star-struck city-dweller who would do anything to show my gratitude, or the furious rogue templar determined to cow you for your famed defiance?"

"One of the many elven templars?" Taerahel inquired, his amusement plain in spite of himself. Zevran considered this.

"I could wear lifts."

"All right, I hate both of you and I'm going to bed," Alistair said by way of loud interruption, trying in tone for as much weariness as embarrassment, and almost getting there. He got up off his chair, and made more of a show of edging past them both decorously than necessary on his way toward the door. "Just let me know who's trying to kill me tomorrow, would you please?"

"Good night, Alistair," Taerahel said at his back, with a warm little smile. Alistair didn't acknowledge it beyond a noncommittal little hum on his way out, but that was probably good enough, under the circumstances.

\---

What mainly served the palace as a dungeon was Fort Drakon, of course, but neither Zevran nor Taerahel had felt the woman should be sent there sight unseen. There was, however, a modest space below the ground level of the palace proper with a set of holding cells, each large enough for a cot and chamberpot and not much else, and that was where she had been confined for the time being. A guard escorted Taerahel down late in the morning -- although it could have been any time of day at all, as far as one could tell between those damp stone walls -- and agreed with some skepticism to wait with his fellows at the guard station, while Taerahel approached the bars alone.

The maid was a slight young elven woman, scarcely any older than Taerahel himself, light-skinned and with vividly ginger hair that looked as though it had once been neatly pinned up. She sat crumpled on her bare cot with head in hands, still in her palace livery, although the apron looked to have gone with the poison inside it and the dress had been rumpled and soiled. At the sound of Taerahel's footsteps approaching the bars, however, she looked up, raising her forehead out of her palms with a tired, resigned look in her eyes. At the sight of Taerahel, though, it lingered only a second or two -- and then changed, drawing her eyes wide and the rest of her to sit newly straight and upright.

"You," she said, in half a whisper, and then in a rush stumbled up off the cot, over to him, staring at him with the angles of her face strained and white. "Please -- please, help me, ser. It was all just a _mistake_ , I wasn't going to do _anything_ , please, you have to believe me -- "

Taerahel held up his hand, keeping his expression neutral in spite of the irritating distraction of his swell of sympathy. "Calm down," he said, quietly. "Before I'm willing to discuss anything else, I want to ask you some questions. If you answer, and honestly, then we shall see."

The way he'd said it had her looking at him in a moment's wild hope, and he couldn't even say he entirely hadn't meant for it to. She made a visible effort to collect herself, though, to her credit, swallowing and fluttering her eyes closed for a second until she could look at him more steadily. "I'll tell you anything," she said, when she did, shaky with eagerness. "There's no sense keeping secrets about it now."

Taerahel nodded, with a slight approving smile. "Good." He took a moment to consider his angle of approach -- and to extend his well-honed healer's senses toward her body, focusing on monitoring the rhythm of her heartbeat and the temperature and humidity of her skin as he went on. The things that would be most likely to change if she were to lie to him. "You said just now it was a mistake, and you didn't plan to do anything. What did you mean?"

The maid seemed briefly startled -- probably that he'd even listened to her -- and then sighed, sinking miserably against the bars of her cell where she clung to them. "It was all only foolish bad luck, ser, and surely what I deserve for being such a fool myself. I..." Her eyes flickered toward the cluster of guards by the door, and she lowered her voice, leaning in as close as she could to where Taerahel stood outside the cell. "I'm not proud of it, like, but I have a friend in the guard, and she -- told me that she'd seen some fine things on one of the men who came to stay with the bann, and when they'd be out of their rooms during the day. So maybe I could nick a bit of something while I was cleaning, see? Something that'd not be missed right away, and they'd be off before they'd noticed, most likely." Taerahel's eyebrows had climbed a bit by now, but he nodded anyway, companionably enough. He could read no sign of falsehood off her at all, and his manner even seemed to be easing her in general: she was speaking more quickly, more readily, as she went along. "He more had strange things, mostly, from what I found, but that little bottle -- I've seen that stuff before on the market, when those foreign men used to have a stall there. I know how dear it is, and I just thought..." She lost her thread there, and then gathered her breath, fixing her eyes on Taerahel's again with all pleading in them. "I was just going to _sell_ it, ser, I swear to you! I don't even serve in the kitchens, and I surely never meant to poison a single soul, least of all the _king_. I would never. I was just trying to get out the side door to keep from going by the guards at the front, and then that man came by, and..."

She faltered there, and Taerahel took over from her quickly, looking intently at her face. "The poison was in the effects of one of the men with Bann Ceorlic?" The maid nodded, frowning back at him. "Which one?"

"I don't know, ser," she said, looking unhappy to admit it. "They were never there when I was cleaning, and I scarcely even saw them round the palace."

Taerahel nodded, thinking quickly. "You said there were other strange items -- what were they?"

"Things for fighting, mostly. I-I don't know much about it, but I could see that much. Knives, and leathers, and a bow. I thought he must be some sort of bodyguard." Not an unreasonable conclusion, to Taerahel's mind -- except that he _had_ spent more time around the bann and his companions, and while the man had come with armed guards for the journey, they had stayed with the palace guard during the visit, not with the bann. None of the few men who had accompanied Bann Ceorlic in his quarters had presented as anything but valets. And to keep one's bodyguard hidden made little sense; such a figure was as valuable a deterrent as a defense, and was better to make as visible as possible, unless one was specifically trying to lure an attack.

She'd given no indication of telling anything but the truth at any point, though, and that being so, he doubted she could offer much else. Taerahel thought for a long moment more, under her pleading eyes, and then looked back at them. "I believe you," he said, quietly, and released his close watch on her pulse and skin even as they bloomed with the flush of her relief. "And you've been helpful. ...What is your name?"

"Danna, ser. Danna Vadis." She seemed scarcely able to choke it out past the sudden strength of her emotion. He nodded.

"I'll have the guards release you, Danna, but I'm afraid it wouldn't be wise to restore you to the palace staff. For your sake as much as anything else." She nodded quickly, swiping at her increasingly damp eyes, which he attempted not to notice. "Would it be a hardship for you to leave Denerim entirely, if you had some extra funds for the journey?"

"No, ser," she said, more readily than he might have expected. "I don't have any family since my grandmother passed, and... well. I don't have much else, either."

Taerahel nodded again. "I believe I can arrange a position for you in Redcliffe Castle, if you're amenable. Go home and prepare, and I'll send a messenger with the details and your severance once everything is settled." She could only seem to stare at him, eyes wide and barely seeming to carry any belief in them at all, and he offered her a brief and slightly uncomfortable smile. "I'll try to see to it you're well-compensated there, so you may wish to consider not stealing from visitors in future."

A shrill little laugh seemed to burst itself out of her lips all in spite of her, and Danna closed her eyes briefly even as she covered her mouth with her fingers as though to hold anything else in. "I will, ser," she said. "I mean -- I won't. Never again. I swear to it." And then, with a hard swallow and a tighter grip around the bars: " _Thank you_ , ser. Thank you so much. I can't... Thank you."

Finding himself a bit caught up short, Taerahel could only manage a stiff nod; and then he'd turned and headed back to speak with the guards, mostly to keep from having to think of any other answer.

\---

"So Bann Ceorlic brought along a Crow on his visit to the palace," Zevran said, when Taerahel had finished. He was sitting in a comfortable tumble on the floor at Taerahel's feet, where Taerahel sat in his customary armchair in Alistair's study, and it bothered Taerahel somewhat that he couldn't see Zevran's face just now. "I must confess, I'm not certain whether to be pleased or disappointed that my path never crossed his. I would love to have known if whoever had the honor was an acquaintance."

"No, you wouldn't," Taerahel said, firmly, making Zevran chuckle low. "It's a damned good thing they didn't see you. You are certain of that?" Zevran nodded with a hum of affirmation, though without looking at him still, which he also didn't care for.

"So why would he do that?" Alistair asked from where he sat forward over his knees on the sofa, chin rested against his folded hands, before Taerahel could decide whether he wanted to corner Zevran into meeting his eyes or not. "Would he bring one for protection, do you think?"

"It would be a peculiar choice," Zevran said. The easy way he leaned back against Taerahel's knee as he spoke did help to mollify him, if only slightly. "We are very good at what we do, of course, but for each task its proper tool: we make for better daggers in the dark than shields. If the bann sought to be personally defended, there are more effective professionals for hire, for far more economical prices."

Taerahel nodded, and repeated some of what he'd thought when talking to Danna: "And you only hide a bodyguard if you _want_ to be attacked. Otherwise, people knowing you've a bodyguard is half the point." Alistair nodded to that, equably enough, while apparently still thinking.

"Do we think he meant to kill me, then?" he asked, after another moment's pause. "I mean, I can't help but notice I'm not dead. Nor is anyone else in the palace that I'm aware of, for that matter." He frowned, sitting back with his hands dropping heavy to his thighs, as he met Taerahel's eyes. "Was it because of you, do you think? Or the both of us together? You were with me more than once when I met with Ceorlic's group. Just going off reputation, they could have decided they didn't like one Crow's odds against us after all."

"Particularly given what happened on the last such attempt," Zevran said, far too cheerfully. "Although I ultimately have no complaints, an exact reenactment seems unlikely."

"Extremely," Taerahel agreed, smiling a bit, and smoothed his fingers once along the pinned-down hair at the crown of Zevran's head. Zevran leaned back into it like a cat, and from the corners of his eyes Taerahel could see Alistair trying to look elsewhere in discomfiture, amusingly enough. "I don't think that's it, though. Why would he have brought the man here in the first place, then? It's certainly no secret that I'm staying here, and neither is your being another of the Wardens who ended the Blight." Even as he said it he looked back at Alistair, who frowned, considering it.

"It doesn't seem to follow," Alistair said after a moment, nodding. "Do you have any idea what he might have been doing?"

Taerahel _hmm_ ed to himself, and then craned to one side so he could at least see a bit of Zevran's profile. "What do you think, Zev? You are the expert here, as it were."

What he could see of Zevran's face was quite neutral, in a way that was very familiar to Taerahel by now, even as his tone stayed more or less light and pleasant. "I cannot be entirely certain, of course. But if I were to hazard a guess... I would say that the gentleman in the bann's company may have been invited in order to take the lay of the palace, in advance of a more concentrated effort." He tilted his head up a bit to look up at Taerahel, and sure enough, there was a shadowed something in his eyes that did not quite match any other part of his face or tone. "Where one or a few Crows have failed in the past, sometimes more cleverness is needed -- and sometimes, simply great enough numbers to overwhelm."

Taerahel nodded, slowly, even as Alistair frowned deeper than ever. "Well, the latter at least seems like it would be difficult to hide," Taerahel said, his gaze drifting away from either of them in thought, before flickering back to Alistair. "Do you know much about Bann Ceorlic? Any idea what sorts of resources of his we might be able to track to that sort of a plan?"

"No," Alistair said, the frown still carved into his brow and his mouth now beginning to twist. "But... I'm afraid I think I know who might."


	2. Compromise

There had been no time in the final attack even to evacuate Denerim's citizens, much less its prisoners, but given the sheer density of Fort Drakon, most of its areas of sequestration had remained locked and sealed even to darkspawn during the worst of the fighting. All things considered, more prisoners had probably survived the Archdemon's assault than guards, apart from the occasional cave-in or collapse. This included the upper levels, up through the main tower, where there were only facilities and cells for the most prestigious of both guards and captives, respectively. No doubt the noise of the horde tramping through the halls and roaring on the rooftop had made for a truly horrific night of it, but the tower's best-known prisoner had in the end escaped the incident without harm.

The cell was bare, forbidding stone, of course, with only a barred slit for a window, but honestly not so bad for all of that. There was an acceptable-looking bed, some modest private toilet facilities, even a small humble writing-desk and chair in one corner of the close walls. On top of its regular occupant and two guards on the door, the room was scarcely of a size to be able to accept both Alistair and Taerahel as well. Nevertheless, once let inside, they managed to crowd together close enough to the iron door to leave some respectful distance still. The cell's occupant was sat at the desk when the door opened, and remained intent on whatever work held her attention there for several long seconds before looking up.

"Ah," Anora said, and politely raised an eyebrow. "And to what do I owe the honor of this visit, I wonder?"

"Hello, Anora," Taerahel said, with a smile that she merely regarded with mild interest, as though it were a specimen for study. "It's been some time since we saw each other last. I do hope you haven't been uncomfortable."

"In my imprisonment? A commendable feat of optimism on your part." Taerahel said nothing and miraculously neither did Alistair, and after a moment she sighed and relented slightly, turning more fully toward them in her chair. "I have not been ill-treated, no, and I suppose that is cause for gratitude. I confess, I did wonder if after the Archdemon's defeat, with my utility as an immediate successor no longer of such importance, I might be put to the sword at last. How generous of your Majesty that this has not come to pass."

"Yes, what a soft touch I am, always not abusing my power to execute people," Alistair said, dryly, from over Taerahel's shoulder. Not surprisingly, Taerahel's standing slightly in front of him did not obstruct his view in the slightest. "Look, lovely as it is to catch up, there's actually something we need to ask you."

Anora looked between them, one to the other, and her expression changed not at all. Of course it didn't. "And what would that be?"

Taerahel glanced up over his shoulder at Alistair, and Alistair glanced back at him, and after a second of that Taerahel inched a bit further forward to let Alistair take up a step more of the cell. "Bann Ceorlic, of the Southern Bannorn," Alistair said, at the pause's end. "He voted with Loghain at the Landsmeet, but Eamon told me beforehand that he was a lost cause. He said he was something of a family friend of yours."

Anora waited a moment after that, but when Alistair said nothing more she formed her mouth in a slight unmeant smile. "That is a rather overly generous description of the relationship," she said. "Ceorlic was less my father's friend and more his most fawning sycophant. The teyrnir bordered upon his lands, and I believe he was very much afraid of falling into my father's disfavor -- particularly given his own father's treachery in years past."

"Oh, afraid your father would do something terrible because he was obsessed with the Rebellion?" Alistair said, half a mutter. "Really, what an unreasonable idea, who could imagine such a thing." Only the slightest line drew itself between Anora's brows, but Taerahel hadn't even had to see that much.

"Alistair," he said, softly but firmly. Alistair let out a small noisy breath, but Taerahel took the thread from him neatly before he could argue, if he was going to. "But you are familiar with Bann Ceorlic and his house?" he pursued, to Anora again, really without having ever turned his gaze from her. "Would you say you at least have an idea of his holdings and ventures?"

Anora was watching him closely, her expression entirely flat again. "I would," she said, after a pause of long seconds. "And of what value would that knowledge be to you?"

Taerahel smiled, as sweet and brilliant with winning charm as he knew how. It was surely wasted here, but the habit was too deeply ingrained to ignore. "Does that matter?"

"Very much," Anora said, with deliberate, uninflected emphasis, staring into his eyes. "Because I see no compelling reason why I should share such information as I have with my bastard usurper and my father's murderer, without knowing for what purpose it would be used. Or, indeed, at all."

Taerahel could practically _feel_ stiffness gathering in the lines of Alistair's body, and it was no more a surprise than, really, anything Anora had just said. In her position, would he have acted any differently? Would anyone, even a far more typically forgiving person than himself? "I can understand your position," he said, before Alistair could say anything again, and his smile was smaller but remained. "Then what would you consider a sufficient incentive?"

Anora watched him for another moment. Finally her expression shifted slightly: became a bit less hardened, more composed. "I see only one possible boon that would have any value to me in my present condition," she said. "My release."

"Absolutely not," Alistair said, unfortunately at precisely the same time that Taerahel said, "That could be done."

Anora's eyebrow raised again, and Taerahel turned to look at Alistair only to find his gaze thunderously met. "What?" Alistair demanded, getting in ahead of him this time. "You can't possibly want to _let her go_. Why do you think I had her put here in the first place? She can't be trusted."

"She doesn't have to be," Taerahel said, quite reasonably, he thought. "We have more time to make arrangements now. Let a detachment of soldiers escort her to the Orlesian border, and release her into exile. Or put her on a boat to the Free Marches, I suppose, if she shares her father's prejudices."

"I am still within earshot, you realize," Anora said, sounding almost amused, from behind Taerahel. They were at least both united in ignoring her.

Alistair was still frowning, but in a more troubled way now, as though he were less entirely sure of what he was saying. "We don't need her. There are other options."

"Quite possibly," Taerahel agreed readily, regardless of whether he thought it was true or not. It would be of no benefit at all to suggest in Anora's presence that she was their only avenue for information. "But I don't think it's so unreasonable a thing to ask, all things considered. Were you planning to keep her locked here for the rest of her days?"

That troubled Alistair's expression more than ever, and the way he looked away was telling. No, of course he hadn't; he hadn't even really wanted to keep her this long. He might have learned to carry himself with a bit more cunning and self-interest since becoming king, but there were more reasons than one that Taerahel still took most of the uglier work in hand. He simply cared too much for his own good -- but he knew it well enough to try to bluff. "That's not really the point," Alistair muttered at last, though he didn't elaborate, and then he sighed and rubbed the ball of his thumb over his brow. "Fine. I don't... If you think it's for the best." Taerahel nodded, and Alistair looked past him to Anora, with his expression drawing tight again. " _If_ you tell us what we want to know, and _if_ it helps us stop him... then all right. I'll release you into exile from Ferelden. Will that do?"

"From the sound of it, I suppose it shall have to," Anora said, with a thin, politic smile. "Stop him from what, might I ask?"

Alistair opened his mouth to say something, probably sharply again, but he didn't get there in time. "Assassinating Alistair," Taerahel said, in much the tone he might have offered a bit of idle gossip over tea. "We were most interested in discovering what sort of means Ceorlic might have for concealing plots and cells of foreign agents, actually."

" _Taerahel,_ " Alistair said, in what was probably meant to be a forbidding growl and came out more in the range of an offended groan. Taerahel glanced back at him.

"Yes? She's still in prison. What do you imagine she'll do, stick her arm out the bars when they attack and give an approving gesture?"

Alistair didn't seem to have much of an answer for that, although he was still in a bit of a huff, and Anora looked more plainly amused than ever. "Perish the thought, Warden Surana." Taerahel smiled acknowledgement, and she sat back in her chair, appearing to consider. "I would not have expected Bann Ceorlic to feel such loyalty to my late father as to attempt an assassination. Still, perhaps he has less sentimental motives at heart." She thought a moment longer, tapping her finger on the desk, and then looked back up at them. "Ceorlic's holdings in the south are modest, but I understand that he has accumulated a significant amount of liquid wealth, through heredity and acumen both. That is likely what would be of most service in an assassination attempt, although he does also possess some real property within Denerim. There is of course his local estate, although I cannot imagine even a novice in these machinations would be so foolhardy as to base his operations in such an obvious place."

Taerahel nodded; he and Zevran had actually made a brief detour before this visit to break into the estate and investigate, just in case, and found it unsurprisingly to be nothing but closed shutters and dust-covers. After a bit more consideration, Anora locked her eyes on his.

"There is one other holding that is less common knowledge, however, that may be relevant to your investigation," she said. "Ceorlic owns a cargo ship, the Red Star by name, and a pier to serve her in the northeastern docklands. By reputation, his fortune has been bolstered by a lively importing business that this vessel has enabled. By rumor, however, it is my understanding that this is a polite fiction, intended to obscure the fact that a not-insignificant portion of Ceorlic's wealth is down to more illicit trade, conducted with the aid of the ship's many hidden compartments. And that of the port authority's indifference, one supposes."

Taerahel glanced back at Alistair again, who at least appeared to now be too intent on the matter at hand to focus on his recent slights. "That sounds very likely to be of interest," Taerahel said, looking back at Anora. "Is there anything else of which we should be aware?"

To her credit, Anora appeared to give that question some genuine thought. "I do not believe so," she said at last. "Still, should the shipping concern yield little of consequence, I pray you return in case I may have recalled something previously overlooked." A ghost of a smile twisted at the edges of her mouth. "I would not wish to lose the opportunity to fulfill my end of our bargain."

"If I'm still alive at that point, we'll see about it," Alistair said, dry again. "But let's hope this is done with on the first try."

"Quite so, your Majesty," Anora said, with a smile that continued not to touch her eyes. Taerahel mirrored it, even sketching a little bow.

"Thank you for your assistance, in any case, Anora. It is a pleasure to see you again."

She did not reciprocate the sentiment before they excused themselves; but then again, he couldn't say he was surprised by that, either.

"A smuggling ship would lend itself to a variety of methods of foul play," Taerahel said in low undertone to Alistair as they were escorted along the halls back out of the fortress, at least attempting to keep it from the ears of the guards escorting them. Not that it probably mattered, considering how much they would have already overheard. "That in itself doesn't really do much to narrow down Ceorlic's approach, at least sight unseen." He considered briefly. "With the exception that I think we can rule out seduction. We've seen the single Crow he has already, for one thing, and based on our acquaintance I would consider you remarkably unsusceptible. No offense meant."

"I'm not sure whether or not offense is taken," Alistair said, striving for dignity, and making Taerahel laugh in spite of himself. "But... yes, I see what you mean. Will you and Zevran look into the pier and the ship, then?"

"Of course." Taerahel hesitated another moment, looking at Alistair sidelong, and then added casually, "I do hope you didn't find me to be undermining back there. That wasn't my intention."

"Oh, was it not?" Alistair asked, laden with sarcasm; but when Taerahel only smiled, he sighed. "No, of course you were right. It's just as well to have the excuse to let her go. Even though it is probably a mistake."

"Some mistakes are worth making, perhaps," Taerahel said, and smiled again at Alistair's glance. "We'll go to the docklands tonight. If Bann Ceorlic had his man scouting the palace, things are probably already in motion; there's no telling how much time we have."

\---

The harbormaster might not have been precisely eager to respond to the king's inquiries about where Ceorlic's ship berthed, if the rumors were true about what an open secret his illegal trading was, but he also apparently knew better than to try to withhold. A few hours past nightfall, Taerahel and Zevran had found the place, which was indeed so far north along the city's edge that it was almost due east of the market district. They slipped through the shadows of the shipyards and warehouses, until they were able to circumvent the gates and locks of those belonging to the bann.

No ship was docked in the pier at present, not particularly surprisingly, although the sparks of lanterns traveling along the quays and beyond the warehouse windows made it clear the premises were occupied regardless. Amid the murmur and slap of water and the creakings of boards and rope and canvas, it was still easy enough to conceal their footsteps as they drew closer, and the dark around the edges was thick enough to serve. To all appearances the fellow out on the end of the pier was simply a night watchman and the actual docking was largely empty, so they made for the warehouses, circling their shadowed periphery to search for an unobtrusive way in. A side door with an easy enough lock to pick did the service in the end, and they moved silently between crates and boxes and under catwalks, drawing toward the source of the lantern-light.

The light had stopped moving through the building in the meantime, and they found it sitting on a table near the far end of the adjoining warehouse, while its bearer instead leaned over and perused what looked like a great number of foolscap sheets. When they had moved close enough along the opposite side of ranks of cargo to get a better look at the man -- a human in sleek leather, with a trim dark beard framing olive skin -- they both caught up short, and Taerahel leaned in close to Zevran's ear..

"That's one of the men who came with Bann Ceorlic," he breathed, scarcely loud enough to stir the air. Zevran nodded, slow and steady enough not to create a flash of movement to catch the eye.

"I know him as well," he murmured back, just as close and soft. "So that rather settles the matter."

Which all meant that getting any closer before acting seemed imprudent. Taerahel paused to gather his concentration even before uncovering the head of his staff, which he had shrouded to keep from reflecting what light there was. Paralysis had always been his greatest talent outside of healing, and he leaned on it again in his chanting under his breath, and the power he let fly.

All the same, even as the Crow went rigid and wide-eyed with his back stiffened upright again at the table, he could immediately feel the man pushing against the arcane bindings, making him have to struggle back to keep his hold on the spell. Fortunately, Zevran was quick as a strike of lightning: darting in and tackling the man's stiff form to the ground with as little noise as possible, lashing his hands at once under him with far more physical means. When Taerahel rushed in to stand over them both as well -- Zevran poised crouching over the Crow, pinning him by his neck with one hand and holding a knife at it with the other -- he could see a thin trickle of blood already glinting from under the man as it slid over his twisting hands. Whatever Zevran had bound him with, it was cruel enough to cut as he struggled, an added deterrent. Good.

Taerahel let the paralysis ebb away from the man's body and his own concentration ease, although watching closely to see if he would need to cast again. A much heavier breath rattled into the man's chest than the small shallow sips he would have been able to take previously, as he was freed.

"Zevran," the Crow said, hoarsely, and then laughed half on a cough. His accent, as he spoke, was very similar to Zevran's, although in Taerahel's opinion not nearly so enjoyable to listen to. "Of course. I _knew_ you were not dead. They said Taliesin had given his life to slay you, but I knew it could not be so; he could never have succeeded, not against you. I thought, ah! This is only what he wants you to think."

"Yes, how very clever of you, Aurelio," Zevran said, with no apparent interest. "But my companion and I have other matters to discuss with you, if you would be so kind." His hand holding the knife twisted slightly, making this Aurelio swallow reflexively and tauten his neck. "For one, we would very much like to know the specifics of your current client's plot against the king of Ferelden."

In spite of his careful stillness, Aurelio managed another rough laugh. "I'm certain you would. But _I_ still know my work better than that, my friend."

Zevran seemed to have the situation in hand well enough, and Taerahel risked standing away from the two of them to cross over to the table, glancing across the sheets Aurelio had been examining before. It wasn't a familiar format to him by any stretch, but he could at least somewhat interpret the matrix of dates and places and overseas mercantiles. "It looks as though the Red Star is expected back from Wycome within the week, if the weather holds," he turned his head back to say to them both, in a conversational tone, before stepping closer again. "And is there any extra cargo she might be carrying?"

From the ground, Aurelio bared his teeth in a grin. "I have no notion, I'm certain."

"You may want to reconsider that position," Taerahel said mildly, and came in closer still, looming over Zevran's shoulder as much as he was able. "Once the guard on the docks passes by, we'll have a fair amount of time in a secluded warehouse in the night to discuss the matter in more detail." He smiled, fractionally. "I know the Crows pride yourselves on resilience, but I'm not as sure how it would fare against my ability to heal your every wound and start fresh. I'm willing to find out if you are."

"Be my guest, Warden," Aurelio said; if anything, his grin had only widened. Zevran, Taerahel noticed, had not moved, and was watching Aurelio's face with no particular expression at all. "You will bleed nothing from me but your own wasted time."

There was a brief pause, as all of them held still where they were. Waiting, or considering, or both.

"Yes, I expect you're probably right," Taerahel said with a bit of a sigh, and nodded to the look that Zevran shot him. And Zevran cut the man's throat in smooth, quick silence, leaving him first gurgling on his blood and then dead in it before he so much as had time to draw another breath.

They collected up the body and made their way out of the building with it, then lowered it off the most shadowed parts of the dock with such expert guidance from Zevran that it scarcely made a sound, slipping into the dark water. Cleaning up the blood didn't seem worth it; once it had dried it would likely blend in with every other oil and dirt stain on the warehouse floor, not to mention that dumping a body in a busy working harbor was a temporary solution at best. All they really needed to do was keep Bann Ceorlic from knowing his scheme had started unraveling until the Red Star arrived, though, and for that purpose this much should suffice. As for the ship itself, it was unfortunate not to know what to expect, but Taerahel supposed he'd accomplished more than enough lately while being afforded none of that particular luxury. If the ship yielded nothing to illuminate the plot... well, they would simply have to deal with that when it came.

Zevran was quiet as they left the pier compound, and not just in the ordinary way that lent itself to disappearing into the shadows. Curiously quiet. Only when they had returned to the northeastern streets did he speak at last, in neutral, measured tones: "Did you truly intend to torture him, if it had seemed of use?"

Taerahel glanced over at him, surprised, but only shrugged at first. "Oh, I don't know. Likely not. From what I understand, torture's never really much use -- unless you enjoy it for its own sake, which I personally never have. The threat was worth a try, though." He paused a moment, watching Zevran's face, as Zevran continued not to look at him. "...Is something wrong?"

"Not at all," Zevran said too quickly, and did look at Taerahel long enough to smile briefly this time -- though his eyes still looked veiled. "I was... surprised, only."

"Shocked and appalled?" Taerahel guessed, grinning a bit. He was surprised himself when Zevran didn't immediately respond, however, and stopped all at once in the middle of the cobbled side-street, forcing Zevran to have to stop as well and turn to him. "...No, you _are_ upset. You really are." Zevran said nothing, and Taerahel sighed noisily. "Have I outraged your legendary code of strict morality, Zevran? Shall we go and kneel at the Chantry on our way back?"

He was trying for all he was worth to set the words' tone at playful and teasing, not to sound annoyed or sharp, but he couldn't seem to help himself. He _was_ annoyed, and he was actually rather personally hurt in a way that he didn't care to examine very closely. He thought he saw Zevran wince as he spoke, plainly not missing it either, but the look in his eyes when he turned them back to Taerahel was at least a good bit more open, and contrite.

"No, you mistake my meaning. I beg your pardon, my dear. I did not intend to reproach you; at the very least, the absurdity would not for a second be lost on me." He hesitated briefly, and then sighed himself. "But I also do not think you would even have made such a threat when I first met you. Perhaps even as late as when our great battle came to a close. That... does concern me, a bit."

Taerahel had to take a long moment to process that, watching Zevran's face and frowning gradually deeper, before he could compose an answer. "You think you're a bad influence on me?" he asked finally, and again in spite of himself he actually found it touched by the start of amusement again, a slight smile tugging at the corners of his lips. It was one Zevran did not return, however. "Once again, I find myself wondering if you've forgotten to whom it is you're speaking."

"I know very well to whom I'm speaking," Zevran said at once, however, and sharply enough to make him blink. "I am quite familiar with what you are capable of, and what you are willing to do. But I also know _why_ you have always been willing to do it. I know what drives even what some would call the ugliest choices you make, and I -- I respect that deeply. I value it in you. It is a part of who you are and who you are, I love, and have given myself to, and never regretted that." He collected himself back a bit, even as Taerahel was struggling to catch his own breath and balance from all that, to fight down the odd pulse of heat in his face and eyes. Even after all this time, there were still some things he might _know_ , but never expect to _hear_.

"I've lost count of the letters you've received from the seneschal at Vigil's Keep, where the Wardens of Ferelden begin to be rebuilt," Zevran went on at last, a good bit more softly. "It seems that every few days, another appears at the top of the stack. And yet, you still do not answer. I know that it is so. And I find myself, increasingly, with the distinctly uncomfortable sensation of having become an albatross, swinging quite happily from around your neck."

"You're not holding me back," Taerahel said, holding Zevran's eyes with adamant firmness and exasperated warmth alike. "You're not even holding me _here_. Yes, all right, going to Amaranthine would be more exposed for you, of course that's a factor, but I also don't want to be the Commander of anything. Can you imagine? It sounds absolutely dreadful. I like being here, and doing this. I'm happy."

"No," Zevran said, with enough force and certainty to make Taerahel recoil a bit with a deep frown in his brow. "You are comfortable. How well I know the difference. And I would not begrudge you simple comfort, not after all of this, but still..." He took a slow, measured breath. "But I think you know as well as I do that in time, you will be all the more called to purposes to which... I am not well-suited."

"Well, I'm so glad you'll tell me how I feel and how I will feel, when you won't even tell me the same about yourself," Taerahel said, hand clenched around his staff, the irritation in his voice well beyond his ability to restrain. "This is only maybe the first time you've been willing to look straight at me since we found out the Antivan Crows were involved in this plot against Alistair; I'm sure that has nothing to do with any of this."

Zevran's jaw tightened, but he continued looking at Taerahel steadily and said nothing, and Taerahel only looked back at him. Finally, Taerahel relented first, rubbing his fingers at his brow and sighing.

"This is ridiculous to argue about. I can make my own choices, and I have." He looked at Zevran, and then at last dropped his hand away, looking even more. Even with so many fragments of emotion twisting at them, Zevran's well-loved features were finally able to make the anger melt out of him, leaving him only tired and fond and a little regretful. At last he let it all carry him through a step forward, and settled his free hand on Zevran's shoulder, to look solemn and clear-eyed up at Zevran's increasingly hesitant expression.

"Regardless of anything else, one thing I've chosen is to be with you," Taerahel said, more softly. "Because I love you, and that's what I want. I may change my mind about other things; but not that one."

And before Zevran could do anything more than clasp his waist and look unsure how to respond, Taerahel leaned in and kissed his mouth, sparing him the effort.

They lingered there a moment, leaned together in the dark of a dingy side street, letting the kiss draw out as only what it was and no more. And if Zevran's smile was still opaque around the eyes when they eased apart, talk between them still sparse as they made their way with haste back to the palace, well... that would probably be all right, at least given enough time and space. Little by little, always, and one thing at a time.


	3. Hold

An extra watch rotation sent out to the docks, each with a spyglass and orders to report directly should the Red Star's colors be seen, was as much monitoring of the situation as it seemed that they could do for now. They all three passed the following days on high alert -- Alistair included, deflecting what he could of his commitments and responsibilities for the time being so he could also be ready to respond when the ship turned up. Whatever might be on board, it seemed likely the bann would at least have a crew prepared to defend it. They'd fare best against any resistance as the unit they'd been in the past, if they didn't want to involve guards or soldiers -- which they didn't. It would be less risky to bring all Alistair's royal power to bear on the situation, certainly, but it would also definitively tip their hand; if the ship proved to be a false lead after all, Ceorlic would be alerted right away, and likely have time to sufficiently obscure whatever he _had_ been planning to weasel out of capture.

So it would be just the three of them, they agreed, when the Red Star arrived. In fact, in time they found themselves relieving the tension of those days of waiting by training themselves back into better shape: Alistair sweating and cursing through his efforts to pin down Zevran with a practice sword in one of the guards' training halls, Zevran trying to dart and dodge around the wall of Alistair's shield to get in a side strike, and Taerahel sitting in meditation all the while in front of a candle, rehearsing chants and forms and spinning little galaxies of healing or ice or numbness around his hands.

It was actually a little more than a week before the current watchman came racing back with his report, and the three of them hurried into the equipment they'd laid by in wait of this moment. It was just past dusk, the sky deep indigo on one side and a smear of pinks through golds on the other, and it had surely been quite a feat to spot the ship against the already-dark of the sky behind it. At least in the dimness and in plain armor, it was easier for Alistair to get away with roaming in the streets than it might have been.

They made it to the pier just as the ship was looming close, slowing to a crawl as it began to sidle in to its rest. It was of substantial size, especially compared to how most of Taerahel's experience of boats to date had been those few that crossed Lake Calenhad, but not as terribly large as some of the frigates that could be seen at greater distances down along the dockland. Instead, it was a sleek, narrow thing, hunkered low over the water, suitable for the speed and stealth that Taerahel supposed smuggling would require. He and the others hung back out of ready sight, as the first sailors jumped over the side of the ship to begin hauling rope and securing anchor-points, although at some point Zevran disappeared entirely from view while Alistair and Taerahel lingered by the base of the docking. Once the gangplanks had been lowered and more crew began to make their way toward disembarking, Alistair stepped forward, and Taerahel behind him.

"Hello, welcome back to Denerim," Alistair called out with every evidence of good cheer, making the crewmen who were swinging overside freeze up amusingly wherever they were. "Lovely night for it, isn't it? You're in luck, this is the first day it's not been gloomy in ages."

The sailors they could see -- it might well have been all of them, there were close to a dozen in all -- began to collect themselves by degrees, and one in particular who looked a bit more importantly-dressed than the others clambered out onto the gangplank momentarily. He strode down it toward them, his scarred and thickly-bearded face thundering. "And who the hell are you?" he said once he stood just above them with arms folded, with a strong accent of Denerim's streets. At least he didn't seem to recognize Alistair either. "This is private property you're on. I suggest you shove off."

"I actually have a different suggestion," Alistair said, again in a very friendly tone. "How about you all just sort of, you know, don't worry about all this for right now?" He waved an arm vaguely in the direction of the ship. "Go have a drink, have a nice time, get some rest. Come back and deal with it in the morning."

The man Taerahel presumed to be the captain was somehow forming an even deeper scowl, but Taerahel only half-saw it in the process of scanning across the rest. They were armed, certainly, long knives and shortswords tucked through belts, but a number of them were beginning to glance at each other apprehensively -- not really prepared nor eager for resistance, he judged. He stepped a bit forward, taking over and speaking up before the captain could respond.

"Let me put that another way," he said, nearly as pleasant as Alistair but several degrees cooler. "We don't have any interest in doing harm to any of you gentleman. We'd be happy to let you leave now quite amiably. But should you stand in the way of our boarding that vessel, rest assured, harm will come." He also noted, with some satisfaction, that the murmurs and looks of disquiet only increased as the men began to mark his staff. "There are other jobs on the docks that will let you keep your life. Is it worth losing it for this one?"

The captain, however, appeared to have had his fill: his face twisted in a sudden snarl. "Right, get the _fuck_ off my -- " he began, at a roar, as he pulled his own sword from its sheath and charged down the last of the gangplank. Or started to, anyway. Before he could take more than a step, or finish his sentence, the end of a dagger appeared to sprout itself from the leather over his chest, with a dark spreading stain of blood blooming around it with appalling swiftness. The man caught up short, his legs tangling together, and choked blood between his lips once, and then twice. He goggled down for a moment, with comical surprise, at what had been punched through him, before his sword first tumbled from his hand and then he tumbled to the dock, and lay still with blood continuing to pool around him. Zevran stepped forward very casually from where he had emerged out of the shadows, swiping blood from his blade as he came.

"Well, that is one refusal, I am afraid," he remarked, with a broad smile, bracketing the other side of the gangplank from where Alistair and Taerahel stood. "Perhaps the rest of you will be so kind as to consider our generous offer?"

There were a few more very still seconds before the first of the crew broke ranks. One of the sailors who had already been down on the dock, off to one side, started suddenly and then sprinted between the three of them, running away down the pier. And one by one and then a few at a time, the rest inched down the gangplank and rushed away past them, escaping out into the night. They all three stood back enough to let them pass, without further comment. Really, it was quite a relief to see.

When all the crew that had been present were gone, the three of them mounted the gangplank themselves, climbing aboard the deck of the ship and scanning it carefully for any lingering laborers before descending amidships. At the top of the rickety steps down the open hatch, its mouth very dark in the increasing gloom at the end of sunset, Alistair murmured, "Behind me," and Taerahel nodded and let him pass first. It was a familiar rhythm: Alistair taking the point position with shield already raised, Zevran watching the rear, Taerahel protected in the center. They had passed just so, albeit as a much larger group, through so many close caverns of the Deep Roads, or through the twisting low-ceilinged passages of the dungeons under Arl Howe's estate.

No one ambushed them while they were making their way down the steps, however, and no one could be seen immediately ahead when they reached the bottom either. It was hard to be certain, though, given that much of the terrain was lost to shadows in the chancy lantern-light. In the wall under the steps, behind them, were doors to what appeared to be a privy and the captain's quarters, but otherwise all the space below decks appeared to belong to a single large hold -- albeit one loaded with cargo, and interrupted by wooden partitions that divided up the space and provided support for stacking. An open space off to the right held a few ranks of hammocks, and that appeared to be what the main crew had for accommodation. Piles of boxes and crates, clutches of barrels, large sprawling rope nets filled with sturdy and irregular sundries, all occupied the rest of the space in grouped islands, leaving narrow and dim alleys between to let workers pass by. A rope-and-pulley system appeared to have been rigged alongside the hammock area to lift cargo, and one massive, heavy-looking crate dangled from it by a lattice of ropes even now, apparently to make space to pass underneath. Even as close as the underside of the deck was overhead, the lanterns that hung from occasional hooks scarcely threw enough light to pluck its boards from darkness.

"So we're looking for hidden compartments," Alistair said over his shoulder, as they all stood at the bottom of the steps taking it in, without really turning his eyes from the sprawl of the hold. "Any ideas on where to begin?"

Zevran had already been casting a critical eye around, though he glanced back toward Alistair at that; he did tend to do better with making out shapes in the dark than most. "The dimensions below seem a touch closer than did those above," he said, gesturing into the shadows. "I imagine we will most likely find panels along the walls that can be moved aside." Taerahel nodded, following his gaze.

"We'll have need of your excellent eye for such things, then," he said with a faint smile, for no other reason than Zevran's obvious preening under it.

"Oh, most certainly -- although it is good of you to recognize the fact."

"Don't encourage him," Alistair muttered over his shoulder this time, and Taerahel only laughed.

They had only just moved past the hammocks toward the wall behind them, however, after first sidling their way between the neighboring piles of boxes and barrels, before Alistair held up a gauntleted hand and stopped them where they followed. The shadows were even deeper here, the beams from which the hammocks were slung blotting out more of the lantern-light, and Taerahel could barely see Alistair's features as he frowned out back the way they'd come. "I heard something," he said, his voice dropped now to only a hiss. "Do you see anything moving?"

Taerahel squinted, but he couldn't see much of anything besides heaps of cargo. Zevran was still beside him, watchful and with daggers at hand, but he said nothing either as of yet. After a moment Taerahel turned back with it on his lips to say no... and then, now that his eyes had adjusted a bit, he _did_ see something, past Alistair and beyond. Not something moving, but...

"Look there," he whispered himself, and concentrated for a moment to raise a pale glow from the crystal of his staff and point it ahead of them. Alistair turned to follow the gesture, frowning deeper still -- and saw the dark hole that Taerahel had seen, opening into the wall of the ship, and appearing to lead into a space beyond it. The piece of false wall that had been obscuring it had been set carelessly to one side, but it looked as though it must be convincing when set in place: even set with false curving struts to mimic those along the ship's true hull.

There wasn't even time for the full second it took for a question to fully form in Taerahel's mind. Before it had come, movement exploded in a scrabble right at his back -- close enough for the wind of it to stir his hair.

He whirled reflexively, thoughts scattering, staff up and magic tightening around him by instinct. In the light his staff cast he found, mere inches from his own face, the face of a human stranger twisted in alarm and pain -- a man in the same sleek dark leather as the man he and Zevran had killed in the warehouse, with a gloved hand around his throat from behind that clamped his windpipe shut with expert precision. Its pressure was purpling his face and cutting off his air, causing the expression contorting his features, and it was Zevran's hand, and Zevran's face was visible behind the man's and marked with sudden cold, deadly intent. He must have caught the Crow in the second that he'd struck, so close to Taerahel's back he'd already been all but dead where he stood.

Zevran's other hand flashed up with its knife, and opened the man's throat in a pumping spill of blood that was all but black in the dark. The man's own knife dropped from his opening hand, and then he dropped from Zevran's grip, crashing crumpled to the boards.

There was a second of silence after that. And then the hold around them burst into sudden, lethal life.

Taerahel raised a barrier against projectiles instantly around all three of them, and just as quickly it was of use: a clutch of short throwing-knives came flying out of the shadows behind the hammocks and boxes, but slowed when they hit his shell of thickened air and only bounced harmlessly off his long leather vest. Zevran had broken away a second later, darting out to use the dark and cover to be just as elusive as their opponents, and Alistair did his part by charging at a flicker of moving shadow up ahead with sword out and a deliberate shout: both mustering his force and drawing distracting attention to himself. Taerahel stayed with him, following as quickly as he could, and without hesitation. In straits like these, he could only slow Zevran down, and Alistair would need his support more.

Beyond the open area around the hammocks, rounding behind Alistair into a tight space between towering barrels and the hull, Taerahel got his first clear view of the Crow Alistair was after, fleeing ahead of them. Just before the man could dart around another corner and out of sight, Taerahel grabbed Alistair's shoulder and yanked it unceremoniously downward, and hurled a blast of ice over and past it. It caught half the man's body and froze it solid, which threw all of him off-balance and tumbling hard into the ranks of barrels, so that the entire stack swayed unsettlingly. Alistair was on him in an instant, taking advantage of his fall, first smashing into his frozen side shield-first with a sickening _crunch_ and then driving his sword through the part of his body still soft enough to pierce. He dropped in another bleeding heap, and they both rushed over his corpse. After he'd moved past the still-wobbling barrels, Taerahel paused for a second to concentrate and then draw the air in around him in a sucking rush of force, hauling them past their tipping point. The stack crashed in behind him with a thunderous cacophony of colliding and splintering wood, creating a massive deadfall of heaped barrels and broken struts to block their backs from attack, and obscuring the sound of their footsteps briefly from their stealthier foes.

When their path around the hull met another that cut through the middle, there was a moment of visibility where they could see most of the hold back to the steps they'd come down. To one side, back near the hammocks and half-obscured behind cargo, Zevran was locked in combat with two other Crows, their figures all only shadows in the dim. Alistair changed directions and tore off toward them, and Taerahel followed again, as much clambering over the smaller stacks as following the path between. It was a man and a woman Zevran was caught between, and he was holding his own, of course: catching a shortsword on the dagger he'd twisted behind him seemingly without looking, even as he flashed a vicious strike out with the other, which the woman dodged in a fluid backward arc so deep it scarcely looked possible. It didn't survive Taerahel's running in close enough to paralyze her right at that point, however, and her eyes went briefly huge before she went to the ground. Zevran moved to pin her throat with one foot while he pierced the man's chest and side with a few savage stabs too quick for him, and then he stooped and finished the woman in the next breath.

Then he was melting out of easy view again, circling Alistair and Taerahel as they stood back-to-back much more in the light. A glass vial of an unpleasantly yellow liquid came flying in overhead almost at once, but as soon as Taerahel spotted it he shot a thick shell of ice around it, so it fell heavily out of the air and he could catch it neatly in his hand like a ball, the vial at its core still unbroken. He managed it just in time for a clutch of more Crows -- he thought he counted four at a glance -- to dart in and drop from the heaps around them, and Taerahel wasted no time in throwing the ice-covered vial with all his strength and some magical force besides at the box by the nearest one's head. The ice shattered in a white explosion against the hard heavy wood, and the vial with it, so the woman had to press her sleeve over her face and waste precious seconds dodging away. Vile yellowish gas bloomed where she had been, making the boxes beyond it appear to shimmer and distort.

Zevran appeared from nowhere behind another man to stab through his back with both knives, sending him bow-backed and groaning to slump into the heaped boxes beside him, but the next Crow was quicker. He turned on Zevran with a cat's grace and they circled each other, swiping and sliding, eeling in close and over and under and away from each other with a sinuous beauty like dancing. The other two were closing on Alistair, feinting and darting and never quite in reach, one throwing a knife to make him catch it on his shield so the other could try to strike before he could move his sword. Taerahel turned on them, looking for an opening around Alistair's armor for something to slow them down with --

And sudden blistering pain erupted all at once in the side of his back, startling a choked cry out through the clench of his teeth.

It distracted both Alistair and Zevran into looking at him for a potentially deadly second, much to his chagrin. He snapped back "I'm fine!" as loud and rough as he could before he had any idea whether he actually was fine, just to make them mind themselves. Even as he did, he was already whipping around, finding the culprit -- another elf, slender and face contorted in a furious snarl -- already going for another strike with his second weapon. Taerahel caught it on his staff, just barely, and then exploded a burst of force from its crystal in the Crow's face, knocking him stumbling back a few steps. From the feel of it, the knife that he'd put in Taerahel's back had stayed there, and Taerahel reached back and yanked it out, this time clamping every inch of himself against making a sound at the new and massive tearing bolt of pain. Before the Crow had fully recovered, Taerahel stepped in and clamped crushing force around his whole body, lifting him from the ground and splintering bones in his flesh. Even while the man hung there, sickly white and with no breath to even scream his agony, Taerahel slashed up and across his throat with his own knife and ended him.

The second his adrenaline ebbed, though, he became aware that the pain in his lower back was too much and too deeply burning to be just the stab-wound, and he was already beginning to feel shaky and sick at the edges. "Shit," he muttered, leaning hard on his staff as he dropped the knife, and stumbled back a step into Alistair's range, where he was still contending with multiple Crows. "Poison," he said over his shoulder in Alistair's direction, both an explanation and a warning. "Cover me?"

"Done," Alistair replied without turning, just as tersely, voice heavy with breath as he shifted out of the way of a strike. Taerahel allowed himself to twist aside and put his back up to a wall of crates just out of Alistair's way, and even as Alistair was finally managing to run through one of the Crows harrying him, he pivoted to put his shield and armor straight in the path to Taerahel. The magic the fight had been burning was adding up, though, and first Taerahel grabbed a lyrium potion out of the pouch at his hip, pulling the cork with his teeth and spitting it to one side before downing the contents. The cold burn of it surged with fresh power all through him, tingling in his head and chest and hands, and on its crest he reached behind himself and, without thinking about it for an instant, shoved two fingers through the tattered leather and cloth and straight inside the knife-wound in his flesh. The pain tore a low grunted sound out even through his closed teeth, beyond what he could hold back. This sort of thing wasn't pleasant or even always necessary, and it would make the wound itself harder to heal, but with the poison already working its way into him he could use as much direct contact with his own bloodstream as possible.

With Alistair guarding him and close to finishing the other Crow he was contending with, Taerahel let himself close his eyes a second or two to concentrate, quickly tracing the path the poison had already made through his veins. Then he could draw back against it: bending the systems and humors of his own body to his will, making it fight against the incursion even as he began to physically compel the foreign substance and fouled blood back toward his hand. A glut of hot blood pumped suddenly over his own fingers and palm out of the wound behind him, and then another, forcing the injury briefly wide and making him choke on his breath again, but taking with them most of the poison that had entered, enough that his body could safely manage the rest. For a few seconds more he could only shudder and lean where he was, gulping air and letting his flesh sort out all the trauma he and others had just put it through.

Which meant that when he looked up and saw the crate swinging toward him, there was no time to do anything but widen his eyes.

It was the huge crate that had been dangling over by the hammocks -- drawn back and shoved forward from behind as a weapon, a makeshift wrecking ball barreling in and filling the world. A few of the remaining Crows must have slipped away and hauled it into position. There was no time, no way to stop it. All of Taerahel clenched by reflex against the inevitable blow, sure to crush him against the crates behind.

Except then Alistair was there the next instant -- shield up, blocking the way to him as though the crate were just another man. And its full force struck him, instead.

Every impression of its weight had been true, and the sound of it against Alistair was a thick heavy _thud_ of meat and metal, wincingly loud. He didn't quite go flying off his feet, but he went backward hard enough it was a near thing, and the cushion of magical force Taerahel's instincts had been half-able to throw up before impact dulled his strike against the boxes behind only a little. He went down in silence along their ragged wall as the crate swung away again, his shield fallen at an angle that didn't look right at all, his breastplate actually a bit dented with the force of where his protecting arm had been driven into it. For at least a few harrowing seconds there was no consciousness in his eyes at all.

Taerahel dropped to his knees beside him without thought, barely feeling the huge wideness of his own eyes and the colorlessness of his face. He grabbed at Alistair's head around the sides and turned it toward him, and Alistair's eyelids flickered; and then he was groaning, and finally, blessedly turning a foggy squint up toward Taerahel. Taerahel breathed for what felt like the first time since he'd seen the crate, and moved down Alistair's body with brutal efficiency, hurrying to try to free his shield when he saw the state of the arm it was strapped to. The break was bad enough that bloody bone had actually pierced the uncovered chain above his gauntlet, and he muttered an apology when maneuvering his arm out of its shield-grips made Alistair shout and swear.

"You absolute idiot," he found himself snarling under his breath even as he was working the shield away and setting it aside, getting Alistair settled in some sort of safe order. "The shield is for blocking _swords_ , not _cargo_."

"You're welcome," Alistair said, slightly slurring it through a lopsided grimaced smile, which Taerahel could not even possibly dignify with a response right now.

"I'm going to have to set that and we don't have time. Hold still and do _not_ move it. We'll cover you and finish taking out this rubbish." He clambered back to his feet, snatching up his staff to use again as a brace, while Alistair nodded. "I mean it. If you move I'll kick you when I come back."

"They teach really great bedside manner at the Circle, have I ever mentioned that?" Alistair wheezed after him, but Taerahel was already darting around the still-swinging crate and rushing toward where it had been pushed from, and could easily pretend not to hear.

The Crow Zevran had been fighting when Taerahel had been so painfully distracted lay dead behind them, and when Taerahel ducked in toward the hammocks again he found Zevran had beaten him there: he was already holding off one of the remaining Crows, and the other three were in the process of leaping down to him from the cargo they'd climbed up on to swing the crate. Taerahel diverted mid-run to move closer to those three than to Zevran, and stopped only when he could plant his feet and concentrate for a moment, unleashing a wave of paralytic energy just as they reached the ground. All three were frozen in place where they had landed, and even as Taerahel concentrated on holding them, Zevran wasted no time. He feinted the still-moving man he was fighting into a lunge in the wrong direction, and used the momentary overbalance to skirt around him to the three who couldn't move, finishing them in rapid succession. Then Taerahel could release, catch his breath, and hurl a last blast of ice at Zevran's recovering opponent, sending him to the ground, where a second later Zevran's dagger drove into his prone back.

Instinctively, Taerahel threw another glance back at where Alistair lay crumpled, but he saw no one else, approaching Alistair or otherwise. He turned back to meet Zevran's eyes instead, scrubbing sweat-threaded loose hair out of his face as they both panted their breath.

"Alistair's wounded, I need to work on him," Taerahel said, nodding behind him. "Sweep for any others and call if you need me?"

"I shall," Zevran said with a fast nod, and bothered with nothing else before weaving out among the criss-crossing pathways again. Taerahel huffed a breath and rushed back to Alistair, dropping next to him again with his staff laid along his side.

"All right, let me see," he said quietly, and leaned in closer over Alistair's arm, being careful to take hold of it only at the bicep and hand. Both were feverishly swollen all the same, though, and Alistair still slitted his eyes and groaned through clenched teeth. Taerahel took another steadying breath and sought for Alistair's eyes, waiting until they met his. "I'm going to set the bone so I can start healing the break. You're not going to like this."

"And here I thought it might be a good time," Alistair said in as dry and airy a tone as he could muster, which wasn't much. "Do it."

Taerahel nodded, and tried to let as much numbness unspool into Alistair's flesh as he could without his staff in hand, even while he secured a better grip. He braced his hands, summoned his strength, and then as fast as possible, pulled and pushed and wrenched the broken bone all in the same motion, into a straight line.

Alistair's shout was loud enough to fill the entire hold, of course, but Taerahel could hardly have begrudged him that.

They both breathed for a second, the wave of pain still shuddering its way through Alistair's body, and then Taerahel picked up his staff and closed his eyes, and focused in around the ragged lineup of bone and the damaged flesh around it. It wasn't what he'd call a clean break exactly, but there didn't seem to be any loose bone-fragments around it, and Alistair was all the more fortunate for that. The way was clear enough that with the energy he had left, Taerahel could safely speed the bone's work of growing back into itself, and help the wounds around it repair themselves and knit shut. He was glad to see that what he could do was at least enough to let some of the twisting agony relax back out of Alistair's face, and his breath begin to shudder in and out more normally again. It was likely some of Alistair's ribs were broken as well, but those would keep better until they could move somewhere safer to get Alistair's armor off.

Taerahel was just running out of the strength to keep healing again, having to sit back on his heels and pant with his head down, when Zevran's voice carried to them from around the corner of the nearest pile of crates. "It would appear that all are dead," he said, with a characteristically inappropriate note of good humor, "although of course, I recommend caution as we leave the ship, just to be sure. A dozen Antivan Crows, in all." He came to stand above them and cast a critical eye around the quiet hold, even as Taerahel was looking blearily up at him. "I suppose at the least, one cannot say we are not held in high regard by his Majesty's enemies."

"I've seldom been so flattered," Taerahel said, his voice still thick with breath. He armed at the sweat on his forehead again, trying to pull himself together a bit. "And I'd say they're quite right to think so, apart from Alistair trying to shield-block a wall."

"You'd rather I'd let it pulp you?" Alistair asked, and with the actual energy now to sound affronted, enough that Taerahel smiled. "Because if so, I'll keep that in mind next time."

"Don't let's have a next time, if you don't mind." He squeezed a familiar hand around Alistair's uninjured arm even as he said it, though, and then started trying to clamber to his feet. Zevran came to assist him at once, crouching to slide under his arm and gently support around his middle, and he wobbled upright with more success than he'd expected. "Let's just -- get back to the palace, so I can get some more lyrium down me and finish healing Alistair and me both."

"That I can most certainly agree with," Zevran said; and then they were both bending again, to help Alistair up too between them.

\---

They left both the ship and the pier without incident, as it turned out, and the trip back through the city was gratefully uneventful as well. After Alistair had sent guards to secure the evidence of Bann Ceorlic's misdeeds -- his owned ship found full of undisguised smuggling compartments and assassins' corpses ought to do nicely to have him out of the way -- the three of them were able to retire to Alistair's sitting-room again to tend to themselves. Taerahel helped unbuckle Alistair out of his armor and commanded him bare to the waist as well, while Zevran went to retrieve more lyrium potions from their quarters, and plenty of water.

"Thank you, for blocking the crate," Taerahel finally managed in a low and grudging tone, as he helped Alistair maneuver his still-stiff arm out of his tunic and thinner undershirt. "That would have been much worse than an arm and a few ribs, as I'm sure you're well aware."

Alistair shot a tired, amused little smile over one shoulder at him, carefully shrugging one shoulder out of his shirt to free the breadth of his back. "Yes, well, no need to thank me for standing in front of things. It's what I'm here for, isn't it?"

"No, it isn't," Taerahel said, with enough actual waspish heat to make Alistair glance at him again. After a moment, though, he sighed and looked away himself. "I'm not cross with you, I'm cross with me. It was foolish for you to come at all, and I should have thought better of it. Zevran specifically said reinforcements were a possibility; it was a stupid risk to bring you along potentially straight to your assassins, regardless of our few options, and it went about as badly as it could've."

"Which we still walked away from," Alistair pointed out, while Taerahel was turning to fold his tunic and shirt to one side. "And that's hardly your fault, besides. You couldn't have known Ceorlic was going to go quite that far overboard." Taerahel made a thin noise under his breath, but Alistair just shook his head. "I don't regret it, at any rate. As rough as that was with all three of us, I don't like to think what it would have been like if it'd just been you and Zevran there."

An entirely fair point, though damned if Taerahel was going to admit it. "That's what _we're_ here for," he said, turning a bit of a smirk back to Alistair. Allistair just twisted carefully around on the couch to face him, though, wincing even as he was smiling a little again. The occasional scars visible across his chest and arms had largely whitened with time, although Taerahel could still remember healing most of them.

"No, it isn't," he said, in a much calmer and more rueful echo. "I mean, don't get me wrong, I know you'd prefer if I didn't die, and don't think I don't appreciate that very much. But I think we all know it's not the main thing you're _meant_ to be doing." He paused a second, and then gave Taerahel a more sober and speculative look. "Especially according to Weisshaupt, I'd imagine."

...It really was a mistake to underestimate Alistair, and one that was always so easy to make. Taerahel made his mouth into a smile, keeping his eyes turned down to start investigating Alistair's arm again. "They've made it known that they'd prefer me in Amaranthine," he allowed, prodding lightly with his fingers at his own work. "Although for some reason they have chosen to phrase it as a request, for the time being, rather than the order I might have expected." He glanced up at Alistair, and his smile turned both realer and sourer. "I suspect the prospect of setting as Warden-Commander of Ferelden an uppity elven mage, and one who was thrown out of the Circle for aiding the escape of a maleficar in the bargain, may give even our august commanders pause."

Alistair shrugged, though, with all apparent good humor. "To be honest, in my experience, they've never really been as fussed about that sort of thing as you might expect. Or as other people might like, come to that." He looked at Taerahel a bit closer, and then grinned more broadly. "I think it's more likely they've just heard literally anything about you, and they know how much good it would do to order you to do anything."

"That was much closer to my own assumption, personally," Zevran's voice came from behind Taerahel, and he twisted around smiling to find Zevran coming in from the foyer laden with supplies, and already out of his own lighter armor. Zevran met both of their gazes with a bit of a grin, and set down everything in a chaos of jugs and bottles on the low table along the couch, with much rattling and clinking. "Better the carrot than the stick sometimes, as they say."

"I find it hard to imagine they much mind about that, either," Taerahel said, although he couldn't help smiling at both of them, and catching Zevran's hand briefly as he passed by to sit on Alistair's other side. "Perhaps they just don't see the urgency at the moment, now that the Orlesian Wardens are at Vigil's Keep. I suppose we'll never know." He considered it briefly, and then sighed again, taking up one of the potion-bottles to only fidget with at first. "It really should be you, Alistair. I know you don't think so, and it's a moot point now, but I think you'd have made an ideal Warden-Commander. Far better than I would, Maker only knows. You've already made a far better king than you seem to think, and for that you had even less preparation."

When he looked up he found Alistair staring back at him in plain startlement, though he recovered himself quickly with a swallow and halfhearted smile. "I've had a lot of help," he said, more quietly. "More than I ever expected. And I'm grateful for that too." Taerahel gave him a curious look, and he smiled, laced with slightly bashful new warmth. "You know, back when I was dreading this, I always imagined that it would be just -- me, trying to sort out how to be king on my own, and generally making a muck of it. Having you both along has... made it really not so bad after all. Surprisingly so, actually."

"I'm pleased to hear it," Taerahel said, and it came out just as quiet. And the silence might have drawn out uncomfortably again between them on the heels of that, had Zevran not leaned chummily over Alistair's shoulder, startling his gaze in that sidelong direction.

"I believe the pleasure has been ours, more to the point," he said, with a grin that had for once as much warmth as teasing in it. "What an exciting novelty, to be adjacent not only to a royal reign, but to one in which I actually have some measure of confidence! ...Not that the bar has been set at all high, mind you."

Alistair laughed a little, unable to help himself, although of course he looked at best mildly alarmed by Zevran's weight on his bare back. "Well, I'll... take low expectations for what they are, I suppose."

The smile still lingered on Taerahel's face as he took the potion and set to work, although fortunately the conversation dwindled from there to let him concentrate. He was able to more fully mend Alistair's arm with the extra power, and the two ribs that sure enough had cracked besides, before turning his attention to doing better with his own stab-wound than just getting it to stop bleeding. Zevran passed them both cups of water to drink, and used more of it to clean up the mess of Taerahel's lower back while he worked, and apart from bandying the occasional remark they mostly sat in a tired, amiable quiet. Being so comfortable in other people's company was still enough of a novelty in Taerahel's life that he marveled at it a bit. He had to wonder if he'd ever fully get used to it.

It was that run of his thoughts that had him mulling for a moment after he'd finished his healing, as he was sitting back on the couch to just drink more water and rest his eyes. Eventually, he opened them and looked over at Alistair with clear new focus, before sitting forward to set his cup down.

"You know," Taerahel said, slow and thoughtful to start, "talking of our remaining with you... there's something Zevran and I have discussed before that I'd be interested to put to you." He was aware of Zevran looking at him suddenly very intently over Alistair's shoulder, from where he'd returned to his previous position, with definite amusement mingled into his surprise -- _Really? Now?_ His own gaze stayed only on Alistair, though, who was looking back with guileless curiosity. It was going to be important to choose the next words very carefully. "You see, by this point...we're both fairly confident that you are attracted to both of us. Which is not at all an issue, so please don't be concerned about that. In fact, the feeling is mutual enough all the way round that we had wondered if you would ever consider acting upon it."

When they'd discussed this, Zevran had raised the opinion that regardless of the outcome, the one certainty was that making the proposition itself was sure to be extremely entertaining. He had been absolutely prophetic, in that regard. Every inch of Alistair's body, down to the minutest aspects of his facial expression, appeared to have frozen in place. He was fully arrested in the simultaneous acts of lifting a hand, widening his eyes, and drawing breath to speak, so that now he appeared to be the one who'd fallen victim to Taerahel's paralytic magics. As Taerahel watched him with deliberate mildness, trying not to show his amusement in spite of himself, one lone muscle in Alistair's throat twitched; and then he could finally seem, very carefully, to lower his hand back to his thigh and finish inhaling.

"I'm sorry?" he asked when he had, a little too brightly and loudly but not quite enough so to sound hysterical, at least not yet.

"There's no need to be," Taerahel said, not unkindly, unable to keep from smiling now. "If the answer is no, that's fine, and there's no need to say any more on it."

"And if it is yes," Zevran added, picking up the thread from him as smoothly as though they'd choreographed it, "we would neither one of us consider that anything to apologize for, either."

The stunned silence that followed was a bit shorter this time, and it appeared to consist of Alistair spluttering for breath and words, instead of frozen. Possibly that was progress. "Are you -- seriously propositioning me?" he managed finally, with something unsteadily like a laugh running under it. " _Both_ of you?" Taerahel nodded, his smile pleasant and patient, and something else seemed to occur to Alistair that somehow made his eyes even wider. "At -- the _same time_?"

Taerahel just nodded again, although at this point Zevran had lost his grip enough that he had started having to smother laughter behind Alistair's back. Alistair didn't even react to that, for his part, just staring thunderstruck into nothing in the middle distance a moment. "I don't... honestly even know where to begin with that."

Taerahel's smile broadened, and he moved forward with slow certainty into Alistair's space, closer along the couch. The proximity made Alistair look at him with new alarm thrumming in his eyes even before Taerahel took hold of his hand, lifting it into his own. "Might I suggest at the beginning?" he said, smiling into Alistair's gaze, and his voice now came a step lower and darker. "With the way even when I was the new recruit and you didn't trust me or like me, you couldn't stop taking quick little looks at me, when you thought I wasn't watching." He stretched his hand around Alistair's, running its fingertips along the underside of Alistair's palm and over his knuckles, watching them idly. "Or the way you'd always blush when Zevran teased you along the road, far more than it warranted. Not to mention when you were pretending not to be watching him come into my tent with me, at camp." He leaned closer still, bracing his weight in the process by resting his other hand very casually on Alistair's thigh. Giving up whatever the expression might be on Alistair's face -- Taerahel was sure he could imagine by now anyway -- he instead pressed to his chest, to put his own mouth nearer Alistair's ear. "Perhaps with how quickly you look away from his hand on my waist, or mine at the back of his neck: as though you'd much rather watch very closely, and don't wish to be caught at it. ...Or even with the look on your face when you walked in on us the other night. And the second or two too long it took you to leave again."

His voice had entirely gone to a low purr by now, and at the bottom of his vision he could see the knob in Alistair's throat bob pronouncedly with his swallow. It couldn't help but turn his lips in a hint of a smile, even as he drew back just enough to bring his face very near to Alistair's, and to rest both hands now on his shoulders. The skin there felt stove-hot under them, and he could all but read off Alistair's body like script how intensely he was now aware of the bareness of his chest. The candle-light picked out the scatters of gooseflesh prickling down his arms in perfect detail.

"Or," Taerahel said, with some finality, "you could just tell me if you want to kiss me."

His mouth was close enough for their breath to mingle: his own deepening but steady, Alistair's coming in quick and uneven hitches. His mouth was parted, and though Taerahel's gaze remained intently on its shape, he thought that Alistair had closed his eyes. His breath caught and caught, again and again, trying to speak each time and not being able to gather it all into enough voice to move the air.

"Yes," he finally managed. It was really no more than a puff of air. And though Taerahel couldn't exactly say he hadn't expected it, it was still relief and pleasure enough to make him smile broadly, even as his lips closed the tiny remaining distance and pressed to where Alistair's trembled. Their touch was firm and flush, at first, and then melted into a gradual parted softness, as his hands slid up to cradle the back of Alistair's neck and sink fingers into his hair.

Alistair was stiff and uncertain in the first moments that they kissed: barely moving even to breathe, his mouth hesitantly still against the explorations of Taerahel's and no part of the rest of him seeming able to move. As it went on, though, and Taerahel lingered with his tongue-tip touching now and again lightly to Alistair's lips, he began very hesitantly to respond. First his lips moved, just minutely, to also seek after and trace the lines of Taerahel's, and then one of his hands lifted with dreamlike slowness to finally rest, shy and light, on Taerahel's waist. Taerahel offered a soft sound as praise, and shifted his weight onto his hip to move even closer still, to where the kiss was no longer a bit of a reach and his chest pressed to the skin of Alistair's much larger one. Momentarily Alistair's arms were circling his waist, timidly, and then a moment later both of their weight was shifted at once, as Alistair was drawn backward with a small startled sound by Zevran's arms around his chest.

He was eased back against Zevran, clear alarm tensing his muscles and yet going with the tug pliantly enough. Without ever breaking the kiss, Taerahel went with him, pushing up onto his knees and then stretching out over Alistair, and winding up resting on him and straddling his thigh. He could feel Zevran's hands starting to move and roam over Alistair's chest between the press of their bodies -- drawing out a tiny yelp as one casually brushed a nipple, and making Alistair finally gasp his way out of the kiss. He was violently red when Taerahel glanced up at what he could see of his face, and a bit shaky, and seemed desperately lacking any idea what to do with himself now. Taerahel stroked his chest soothingly, and eased over to one side to rest on his shoulder, even as Zevran was nipping at the side of his throat and making him start.

"I believe it's your turn, Zev," Taerahel said, his voice soft but very much polite. Zevran's shoulders shook with laughter even with his mouth still pressed to Alistair's neck, and then he was looking up, meeting Taerahel's eyes with amusement over Alistair's wildly flushed face.

"Ah, have I missed my cue? How careless of me." He turned to smile down into Alistair's eyes, as Taerahel continued idly stroking Alistair's rapidly rising and falling chest. "I can rectify this mistake, if your Majesty agrees."

"Could you please stop -- asking me to say things," Alistair said in a fast stumbling collision of syllables, all of them still mostly breath. Zevran grinned even as Taerahel turned his laugh into Alistair's shoulder, and after a second more Alistair could seem to gather himself enough to shut his eyes and nod quickly.

Zevran craned in to claim his mouth with pure pleased satisfaction on his features, and Taerahel adjusted his position enough that he could watch comfortably, still leaned on Alistair's shoulder and caressing his chest. It was a sight to behold, enough to make his breath deepen further still and eyes slide half-lidded, and his prick thicken warmly atop Alistair's thigh. Zevran's handsome and finely-boned face, all high cheekbones and smooth planes and angles and the pretty sweep of his tattoo, made a pleasing contrast against the heavier and sturdier good looks of Alistair's, and so did the hungry, plunging authority of Zevran's mouth on Alistair's uncertain shaky lips. He gave no quarter where Taerahel had done his best to be gentle and patient, cupping Alistair's jaw and pressing it up into the ravishing of his tongue, then nipping careful teeth into Alistair's lower lip and tugging it. The latter, in particular, produced a sound from Alistair so whimperingly needy it somehow managed to make him blush harder.

Taerahel shifted his weight over Alistair, experimentally, and smiled when his hip pressed into urgent hardness at once -- and even more so when another sound shuddered its way through all of Alistair's body at the touch. When Zevran finally deigned to give him room to struggle for his breath, Taerahel was already crowding into him again, brushing lips against his neck and pressing back close to his ear.

"Do you remember when we were first becoming friendly, and we once discussed our mutual lack of experience?" he asked, still running his hands over Alistair's chest with Zevran now also doing the same. Alistair's eyes were still tightly shut, his breath nowhere near in order, and he just gave a quick jerking nod instead of trying to respond aloud. Taerahel smiled again, and let it shape his voice. "I suppose you're well aware by now that's no longer the case for me. But I wondered if it was for you."

Alistair hitched a wildly unsteady laugh, and swallowed hard before he could seem to speak. "When do you -- imagine it would have changed?" he managed in a raggedy cracking gasp, barely cracking his eyes open near the end of the sentence.Taerahel chuckled a little, not unkindly.

"I'm not sure, but I can hardly say I watch your every move." He paused a moment to consider, his fingertips idly tracing Alistair's skin, and when he went on his tone was thoughtful. "Zevran was extremely good to me, the first time. It was wonderful." He was aware at the corner of his eye of Zevran glancing at him, smiling with a deep warmth he might not have risked even if Alistair had been looking his way, and that the heaving of breath in Alistair's chest was starting to speed further under his hand. "He sucked me until I came in his mouth, and then he fucked me until I came again -- at my behest, mind you. He was concerned that it would be too soon, but I begged him for it, and it was... perfect." Taerahel sighed a little, fond memory playing in a lazy aroused smile around his lips, even while Alistair was trembling against him as though he genuinely might be on the verge of explosion. "And the only thing he asked of me was that I not try to endure anything that I didn't entirely and unreservedly enjoy, but rather say so and let him try a different approach. Which I thought was very reasonable, and which I'd also like to ask of you." He turned his eyes up toward Alistair's, in spite of how they had fully closed again by now. "Including if you're not sure you wish to go any further with this right now."

Alistair was silent except for the labor of his breath for long moments, although not really concerningly so; he just seemed to be making a tremendous effort to gather himself to think and speak. Then he nodded, swallowing, and opened his eyes enough to actually fully meet Taerahel's this time.

"I can do that," he said, husked-out and uncharacteristically small and sober. "Just, um... please. Now is -- good."

Taerahel smiled at him, broadly and brightly, and leaned in to press a brief kiss to his neck. "Good," he murmured against the skin, and then drew back to sit himself up again over Alistair, hands on his bare shoulders for balance. "You should try to keep mostly still and not raise your arms, though. Let the bone rest until the healing's had time to settle."

And before either Alistair or Zevran could raise any perfectly reasonable objections, concerning how he himself had been the one to start this right after healing a number of Alistair's broken bones, he climbed carefully backward off of Alistair's lap. With a lingering grip on Alistair's shoulders, he encouraged both Alistair and Zevran to move around to where Alistair could sit no longer sideways but straight forward, with both feet on the floor. And in the process, he eased himself down along Alistair's body to wind up between his thighs, smirking a bit up at Alistair's wide eyes, from where he knelt on the floor.

Zevran laughed low approval and then turned Alistair's face back into his for another deep kiss, while Taerahel busied himself with the work of getting Alistair out of his trousers and boots and all underthings, encouraging him through clumsy liftings of his hips and feet. He was helplessly tense and shivering steadily by the time he was naked, and Taerahel rubbed soothing circles on his upper thighs with his arms around them, although he had to admit in the end the gesture had rather mixed effects. When he leaned in over Alistair's thighs it already made Alistair's hips jump in a reflexive half-thrust, and he pressed a firm hand to one hip to hold it in place while he curled the other around Alistair's cock, redly thick and wet and desperate between his thighs.

The sound that burst out of Alistair was all strain in his throat and plosive breath against Zevran's mouth. He shuddered and struggled to keep still, as Taerahel's tongue laved deliberately around the head of his prick. The flesh there tasted a bit of sweat from their exertions of the evening, certainly, but not in an unpleasant way, and far more like the familiar and by now quite welcome taste of cock, for that matter. It was apparent on a glance that Alistair no longer had the presence of mind to keep kissing, and his head soon thumped back on the couch-back with eyes shut and mouth open, Zevran looking quite content to mouth at his neck instead and tease a nail at his nipple. One of Alistair's hands was trembling on Zevran's waist, but the other had fallen at his side and hardly seemed to know what to do with itself, clenching and flexing uselessly. Taerahel left his hip be long enough to take hold of it and place it on the back of his own head, as he sank his mouth with luxurious slowness around the head of Alistair's cock, down around his shaft, letting each inch of wet heat discover him in its turn. The shaky fingers on his hair barely cupped the curve of his head, but did not fall away.

"He has quite the talent, hasn't he?" he heard Zevran murmur from above, and opened his eyes a moment to turn them upward, without ever stopping. Zevran was speaking now as close to Alistair's ear as he had been doing himself before, and a wicked smirk was shaping his mouth, his eyes already on Taerahel when Taerahel's turned up to him. "A mouth so truly sweet it ought to be forbidden by the Chantry." Taerahel let his eyes drift shut again and focused himself on his task, to keep the threatening stretch of his open mouth from unhelpfully becoming a smile. Zevran, not so restricted, pressed a low throaty laugh of his own into Alistair's throat. "Of course, one could scarcely think of anything else, could one, having glimpsed that mouth? Those plush lips, the pale and perfect bow they make... How many times must you have glanced their way and thought of them wrapped around your prick just so, I wonder?"

"And you accused _me_ of trying to kill him," Taerahel said in undertone in the second he let his lips slid away from Alistair's cock enough to clear it, before swiftly returning to running his tongue open-mouthed in a curl up its underside. At least it left him free to grin just a bit for a moment. It made Zevran laugh too, and even Alistair huffed a breathless sound that wasn't without humor, though while turning his brightly flushed face away from both of them. His breath was coming in pants again a second later, anyway, when Taerahel turned to licking and sucking lavishly around his head.

He didn't tease much longer: wanting to draw it out a little, but not so much as to torment a good friend who'd waited so long. After only a few more seconds of tonguing at Alistair's tip, amid lazy firm pumps of his hand around the shaft, Taerahel took it back in, as deep into his mouth as he could. Even before Taerahel's mouth was back around him Alistair's pulse was rushing in his thighs to either side, the ragged sound of his breathing desperate and erratic; he wouldn't be long. Taerahel kept a firm grip at the base of his cock around what he couldn't fit in his mouth, hopefully helping stave off the end just a bit even as it also provided a bracing grip, to help him keep control. That was all the more important as he relaxed his throat and eased the tip of Alistair's prick, with careful deliberation, so deep that it pressed inside.

Alistair made a thin strangling sound a second later, either from the sensation or just from the understanding of what was happening, it was impossible to say. His hand still resting round the back of Taerahel's head spasmed against it, not daring anything but to rest there, but also plainly losing all control.

"Wait, I'm -- going -- " he managed to gasp through a locked throat only seconds later, and no more than that, his voice deliciously wrecked and sounding beyond all sense. Taerahel was grateful not to need to pause to respond; no sooner could he think of it than Zevran was murmuring another dark laugh, and answering for him.

"Go ahead," his soft voice said, and Taerahel felt the backs of Zevran's fingers brush up against his cheek a moment later, as it slid down alongside his head to caress the high inside of Alistair's thigh and tease at his bollocks. "He will be glad to have you."

Taerahel was limited in his ability to assent, but he hoped that the pleased little hum he let shiver along Alistair's shaft as Zevran spoke would suffice. The rhythmic press of his head forward slightly back did distort the sound, but only a bit.

It was definitely enough for Alistair, and right away. He choked on one sound and then another escaped him in full voice, something delirious between a cry and a shout. His hand on Taerahel's hair shivered and clutched in a taut splay, although still gentle even in his extremity. And then his breath was stuttering into a loud crescendo, his hips only able to twitch desperately under Taerahel's restraining hand, as he groaned long and loud and wet heat spilled from his pulsing cock down Taerahel's throat. Taerahel sucked him so deep at his most straining peak that he could scarcely even taste the seed; he just gripped and drew on Alistair as hard as though he'd pull it from him, while Alistair shuddered and whimpered his breath and came apart under both their hands, releasing all of himself into Taerahel's waiting mouth.

He collapsed gasping and boneless back on the couch when he could finally unclench himself, and Taerahel drew back from his cock with luxuriating slowness, teasing out a few last hisses and twitches with little presses of his tongue and lips along the way. At last he let Alistair's softening prick tumble from his mouth entirely, and pressed his lips instead one more warm time to the inside of Alistair's thigh, high up enough that its skim of hair was lightest and that it made Alistair shiver weakly. Taerahel sat back a moment, watching Alistair melting into the couch, panting with his eyes closed and Zevran lazily mouthing at his jaw, and enjoyed simply being pleased with a job well done. Then he took Alistair's hand from where it had tumbled from the back of his head, as he pushed himself back up onto the couch. Back face-to-face with Alistair, he squeezed Alistair's fingers gently until Alistair managed to squint open his eyes. His face was still quite flushed, with a sweet uncertainty in every line of it.

"All right?" Taerahel asked softly, and brushed at the side of Alistair's cheek with the hand not holding Alistair's own. Alistair made a creaking sound not unlike a laugh, turning his face slightly into Taerahel's hand.

"I, um..." He cleared his throat, closing his eyes briefly as he swallowed once. "I think -- you could describe it as all right, yes." His voice had been barely a dusty whisper, and even that much seemed to abandon him there, his gaze dropping away from Taerahel's as he seemed suddenly a bit overcome.

Taerahel caressed his cheek, smiling at him. "We could let this go here, if you'd be more comfortable," he said. "Or, if you'd like, we could all adjourn to the bed, and see what seems like it should come next."

That startled Alistair's eyes back up to his, and managed to summon even more redness back into his face and all down his neck and chest, which was a pleasure to see. He appeared to have to work against his throat for a long moment to be able to speak -- especially given that Zevran had curled around his back again, and taken back up idly kissing the back of his neck. "I... think... I would?" he stumbled through eventually, practically having to catch his breath anew after every word. "Would like. I mean. That. The... bed. If, ah, that's..."

Taerahel took pity on him there, first lifting Alistair's hand to his mouth to press a kiss into its back, and then leaning forward to kiss his mouth instead, kindly stopping its flailing. Instead of freezing this time, Alistair kissed back, craning his head in to press with shy and clumsy eagerness to Taerahel's lips. Even what lingered of the taste of himself in Taerahel's mouth could not seem to give him pause. It was extremely charming, and Taerahel spent longer on it than he'd planned, stroking with his hand along Alistair's jaw and the back of his neck and his hair. It was only reluctantly that he drew back at last, and smiled half-lidded at Alistair, taking up hold of his hand again.

"Shall we, then?" he asked -- more to Zevran now, over Alistair's shoulder, than to Alistair himself. As such, he couldn't much help the bit of a smirk in his voice, and Zevran answered it with a well-pleased grin of his own.

"After you, my dear."

Between the two of them they herded Alistair, blushing and stumbling, back from the sitting room into his bedroom, with the inner door firmly shut behind. The chamber itself was considerably larger and more opulently-designed than the one in their own quarters, of course, but it generally looked noticeably less lived-in, in a number of ways. There was an empty undisturbed look that made it seem less like a place that had been made into a home, and more like a place that Alistair had truly only been coming all this time to sleep, and barely that. Alistair found his way to sitting awkwardly at the edge of the bed, all the same, still seeming to have little if any idea what to do with himself. That left Zevran free to pull Taerahel to him and kiss all the breath from his mouth, running hands over his body with such obscene thoroughness Taerahel could actually hear Alistair's breath catch from where he watched. It made him grin so helplessly he couldn't help but draw out of the kiss too soon, but pursued the momentum by seizing the light sleeveless tunic Zevran had worn between his armor and skin, and helping strip it off over his head. Zevran seemed entirely happy with this development, and added his hands to Taerahel's in getting off his trousers as well, and kicking out of his boots and all the rest. Then he had hold of Taerahel again -- and, somewhat unexpectedly, pressed him around and forward toward where Alistair sat, before reaching to his waist and pulling him out of his vest and just as quickly the shirt he had worn under it.

Alistair's hands, reaching up to gently curl around his sides above the hips, took Taerahel somewhat by surprise, and with his head freed from the process of getting out of his shirt it brought his attention back to Alistair all at once. Alistair was looking up at him -- both of them -- with a wondering and curiously vulnerable expression, though his gaze quickly dropped instead to his own hands, where they rested on Taerahel's skin. Taerahel smiled at him, heavy-lidded at the eyes and swaying slightly into his touch, even while he was moving with Zevran's hands as they finished stripping him out of his breeches and all the rest with businesslike efficiency. He did not miss Alistair's eyes dipping to his bared cock, still heavy and half-hard just below eye level, or the deeper flush in his skin at the sight.

Taerahel rested his hands on Alistair's shoulders, and bent to kiss Alistair's forehead once; and then, as Alistair turned a rather bashful smile upwards, he clambered forward onto his knees on the bed over Alistair's lap, to kiss his mouth instead. Alistair's arms wrapped him with a bit more confidence now, he was pleased to note, hands timid but eager to explore the bare skin of his back. They kissed thoroughly for a moment and then Taerahel eased away and off him to the side, turning to reach out instead for Zevran's hand and draw him down as well. Zevran came with evident pleasure, occupying Alistair's other side and then pressing him unceremoniously to the bed, stretching out atop him for another luxurious time of kissing and stroking. Taerahel was content to lie over on his side and watch, with his smile propped up on one hand, and the other delicately tracing the lovely lines of Zevran's back and its intricate tattoos. He thought Alistair looked more than a bit dizzy and at sea by the time Zevran finally released his mouth to beam down at him, although no less so when Taerahel just leaned in to claim Zevran's mouth for himself, with Zevran still resting atop Alistair's body.

The kiss's eagerness quickly built to where Zevran climbed over to Taerahel, however, and he pushed Taerahel likewise onto his back for Alistair to better see in turn, sliding a thigh between Taerahel's and making him purr. At one point when their mouths were still engaged, Taerahel opened his eyes to glance lazily sidelong over at Alistair, and found him flushed and fixed and watching intently. He blushed more and swallowed when he saw that Taerahel had caught him at it, but did not turn his eyes away. From all appearances, he might scarcely have been able.

"Do you like that?" Taerahel asked softly after they'd drawn apart, and after he'd had a moment to catch his breath. He turned himself a bit toward Alistair to speak to him, reaching out to draw fingers along his arm, although he didn't bother trying to extricate himself from under Zevran. Especially since by that point Zevran was busily nipping at the small gold hoop in Taerahel's ear, tugging gently with his teeth. "Watching us?"

Alistair looked increasingly torn between desire in general and the desire to sink through the floor in specific, but he managed a weak laugh all the same even as he dodged his eyes away. "I, ah... er. Y-yes? It's... good that you seem to be having a nice time, at least."

Zevran laughed into where he'd taken up kissing Taerahel's throat, but Taerahel just grinned at Alistair. "You're sweet," he said. And then, gentle and relentless: "Have you ever thought about us together? Tried to picture what it must be like?"

The flushed extremity in Alistair's face seemed to be fast approaching some sort of cataclysmic event, and he made a small noise like Taerahel had dealt him actual physical damage. He squeezed his eyes shut, and then pressed a palm over his face, the noise of his exhale loud against it. "I... Maker, you're _horrible_ ," his voice came weakly from under his palm after a moment's strain, but the blow of his breath afterward was a definite, if embarrassed, laugh. " _Yes._ All right?"

Taerahel stroked his arm soothingly, in place of an answer. Then Zevran pulled back up off him a bit, so that he could raise an eyebrow in wordless inquiry where Taerahel could see it, and Taerahel nodded back smiling. That sent Zevran climbing off over the edge of the bed again, and when the motion made Alistair move his hand enough to look past it out of sheer curiosity, Taerahel took the advantage instead and wriggled in closer to him, to pet his chest instead. "You rest for the moment, then," he said sweetly up toward Alistair's face, and then began pulling himself a bit upright as well, the better to be able to sort out positioning. "And you can watch Zevran fuck me as long as you like."

He didn't miss the comical hugeness of Alistair's eyes at that, but before he had time to relish it much Zevran had returned, with a flask of oil in his hand. "You see now what a taskmaster our fearless commander is," he said with an affected sigh of weary resignation, to Alistair even in his still-thunderstruck state. "Never do I know a moment's peace."

"When have you ever asked for one?" Taerahel said, amused, and nodded to the flask. "I don't suppose I'm in any position to question why you had that on you."

"I am nothing if not an eternal optimist," Zevran said, pressing a hand to his chest. Taerahel snorted and sat up to take the oil from him while he positioned himself, and then bent to kiss Alistair where he still lay entirely flustered, just for good measure. It did seem to help a bit, although he still seemed rather at a loss as Taerahel and Zevran were moving themselves around. And well he might, Taerahel supposed. Well, little was required of him for the present proceedings, at least.

They ended up lain back down on their sides facing Alistair, Zevran behind and Taerahel in front. He curled comfortably up against Zevran's warmth, and reached out to idly stroke Alistair's arm as Zevran poured out some oil and slicked his own cock. His legs he also kept tucked up enough that Alistair's view was less impeded, of course, and Taerahel noted with satisfaction how he watched -- the look on his face equal parts hungry, embarrassed, and again curiously vulnerable. When Zevran reached under the curve of his arse with slick fingers, Taerahel gripped his own topmost thigh and lifted it, even as he hissed breath and shivered with the sensation. Holding it aloft had the benefit of allowing Zevran easier access, as well as spreading himself as wide as he could, so as much of the process could be seen as possible. Zevran's two fingers penetrated him with luxuriating slowness, spreading slick and ripples of warm want, and Taerahel let his eyelids flutter and his face show all that it would of his pleasure. The stroking warmth inside him lingered only a moment, though, before withdrawing smoothly from him, to be replaced after a moment's shifting with the larger weight of Zevran's cock in his guiding hand.

Alistair's breath caught audibly as he watched, and its sound became decidedly uneven as Zevran gripped Taerahel tight against him with his other arm round his chest from below, and pushed inside him by slow inches. Taerahel braced himself on the mattress, and both his thigh and the hand holding it up were trembling all beyond him by the time he gasped and strained his hips back against Zevran's cock, head falling limp to the bed. As soon as he was fully seated, Zevran took up the work of holding up Taerahel's leg from him, and he could hear Alistair's breath roughening even further still as Zevran began to move, rocking his hips along in obscene waves of motion, first very slow and then into the start of a rhythm. They rolled together, relatively sedate in pace and position, for a few moments, Taerahel's cock filling to complete hardness with dizzying speed where it lay along his lower belly, with the deep treasured satisfaction of Zevran buried inside him. And of course it only made him even harder watching Alistair's desperate and increasingly unsteady gaze, as it followed the way the two of them moved together, the lines of Taerahel's body, the splay of his legs and his cock beginning to bead wet, Zevran's lovely hands in contrast against his pale skin. Alistair was so red since so long at this point it seemed it must be in danger of being permanent, and his hands worked with nervous fidgeting energy on the bed in front of him. His own cock was definitely rallying as well, from what Taerahel could see.

He caressed Alistair's arm with his hand on it, maintaining that connection, even as all of his own body was ever more vigorously in tidal motion with Zevran's fucking him. The slick and drag of Zevran's cock began to make him gasp on every thrust in as it drove deeper, and strain his hips toward it every time it even slightly withdrew. Alistair's hand turning to timidly clasp his own just registered as more pleasure in the confusion of his senses. Coaxingly, he drew it forward the last few inches to himself, to brush its fingers over his cheek, his throat, his chest. Zevran craned in over Taerahel's shoulder to kiss his throat after a few moments of that, making him crane his head to allow it and his eyes drop heavy-lidded with pleasure, his breath through parted lips. Then he dragged sweat-threaded hair impatiently out of his face, and turned back his head to meet Zevran's mouth with his own, for as long as he could bear the straining of his neck. All the while, still holding Alistair's hand pressed over his heart.

When at last he had to let the kiss go, Taerahel relaxed back to look into Alistair's eyes again, breathing hard. Zevran redoubled his efforts and fucked him with all true expertise now, driving his cock home with merciless finality each time, and Taerahel could only imagine how his own face looked as Alistair looked back at it: pale skin mottled with deep flush, breath ragged and wild in his open mouth, eyes clouded lost and melting-hot, hair sticking to his neck and jaw and forehead.

He released Alistair's hand to grope out straining for the back of his neck instead, and with a touching shy slowness Alistair took the hint and wriggled forward across the bed to him, letting Taerahel restlessly caress his chest and nape and then draw him into a kiss. It was slow and even timid on Alistair's part, in contrast to Zevran's good and steady work thrusting inside Taerahel's arse: their lips brushing and fitting softly, although pushed harder here and there by the force with which Taerahel was being fucked. When Taerahel let his fingers drift lower, to the line of hair that trailed down Alistair's lower belly to his cock, Alistair's breath stuttered all at once so wildly out of control that he had to draw his mouth back just to catch it.

"Are you all right?" Taerahel breathed to him, broken between thrusts, his hand just pausing there as they lingered close. Alistair was silent for a second's space, seeming thrown, and then let out another tumble of breath that was closer to nervous laughter.

"I -- yes. Just... a lot." Taerahel smiled his understanding even around the driving force of his breath, and Alistair swallowed hard, struggling. "What, ah. What does it... feel like?"

Taerahel let his eyes drift toward closed again, his smile broadening into bliss as he deliberately focused his attention back on the smooth squeezing pistoning inside him, moving all of him. "Good," he said, in a hot breathy purr, his hand tightening on Alistair's shoulder for a bit of leverage to grind back at the same time. His voice jolted and cracked here and there as he tried his best to keep speaking. "It was strange at first, the first time -- too much of something, inside -- and then it was _so_ good. He does it so well, it was even better than I imagined." He shivered at a particularly deep thrust, perhaps by way of Zevran rewarding his praise, and his mouth parted a bit wider around his voiced breath and eyes shut for a moment before he could collect himself. "It's -- sensitive there, at the edges, and it feels good having it touched and stretched as it slides in. Then deeper, a stretch of the muscles around something hot and firm to grip... it's odd to get used to, but I love the way it feels. And at the deepest point, there's a spot -- " Taerahel interrupted himself with a soft groan as Zevran chose that moment to demonstrate, and couldn't help a breathless little laugh when he could get his voice back. "It's sensitive. Intense. It can almost be too much, but when you're ready and in the thick of it, it just... _feels_." He paused a moment to pant, and then one of his breaths fell out on another laugh. "Or were you asking Zevran?"

It took Alistair a few heartbeats' worth of gulping breath to be able to answer, and when Taerahel drew back just slightly to look at him, the look on his face was nothing less than wrecked. "B-both, I suppose," he managed anyway in a fast rush, and even with at least a touch of laughter tangled into his heavy breath again. Taerahel answered it with his eyes barely open, and he felt Zevran shifting behind him, pushing up a bit on his elbow as the motion of his hips slowed -- and ignoring Taerahel's little whine of protest.

"It would be my pleasure to describe it as well," Zevran said, with a breathy grin Taerahel could hear in his voice, near the side of his neck. "But I wonder if you may be recovered enough to prefer a demonstration -- perhaps even of both sides."

Alistair's breath shuddered heavily against Taerahel's clutching hands, and Taerahel tipped his head back again to seek his eyes, although they were closed for now. "What do you think, Alistair?" he asked in half a whisper, as much sincere as gently teasing. "Would you like one of us to fuck you while you fuck the other?"

All Alistair could seem to muster was a wounded sound, and he burrowed his head down toward Taerahel's chest, as though to escape his eyes. His breath kept coming in frantic gulps, though, his body clinging close to Taerahel's. And after a moment's suspense, he nodded, fast and hard, his hair just brushing Taerahel's chin.

Taerahel made a soothing sound, kissing his temple. "Do you have a preference for which does which, or shall we surprise you?" he pressed, and at least the humor in the question won a little strained huff of laugh out of Alistair, even as he shivered with it.

"Maker, I have no idea," he gasped muffled into Taerahel's shoulder, and that made all of them laugh to varying degrees.

Zevran had stilled entirely behind Taerahel, regrettably, and that regret landed even more keenly when he finally released Taerahel's leg to begin to withdraw himself. Taerahel lowered his thigh wincing back toward the bed as Zevran eased out of him, and could only marvel for a second at the strength of Zevran's arm, under the circumstances. Zevran sat up beside him and rolled and stretched his arm and shoulder a moment, in echo of his thoughts, and then leaned over where Taerahel and Alistair were tumbled together, sliding easily into their intimacy.

"If I may, then," he murmured with a grin still inside it, as Alistair peered up a bit at him too, "I would propose that Taerahel be the one to fuck you first." Alistair's eyes squeezed shut, his breath shuddering again, as Zevran stroked his shoulder and went on. "You do so enjoy to be under his command, after all. And while I do know how he truly loves to take a cock, I also know from experience how truly generous that passion has made him in the giving."

"Aren't you sweet?" Taerahel said with his face also tilted up toward Zevran's, grinning broadly in spite of himself. Zevran answered it with a kiss anyway, caressing his hair briefly before drawing up to smirk back at him.

Alistair gave no objections, at any rate, and so they rearranged themselves on the bed again: finally moving into the proper orientation with its length, rather than sideways along it. Zevran settled Alistair on his side with the two of them facing each other, and Taerahel curled his front along Alistair's back, pausing to kiss the back of his neck for a moment just for how it made him stutter breath and shiver. Between the three of them Zevran found the oil again, and passed it to Taerahel, who slicked his hand with it generously before pressing fingertips between the pleasing curves of Alistair's rear. Alistair twitched at the touch, gasping, and Taerahel kissed his neck again with another soft, soothing sound.

"Relax," he murmured against the skin, while Zevran was also taking it on himself to kiss Alistair and rub slow circles on his chest. "All's well, there's no rush. And if you find it's not for you, we can stop."

Alistair heaved a great breath on a pause in Zevran's kissing, and nodded again, some of the tension easing out of his muscles after some clear concentration. A moment later he made a faint gasping sound, and his hips jumped under Taerahel's waiting fingertips. From that evidence and a glance at how Zevran's arm was moving beyond him, Taerahel judged that Zevran was aiding matters by stroking his cock, and he allowed himself an approving little smirk as he gently began to circle with his fingers again, and then press one forward.

There was another flicker of tension in the muscles it pushed against, but it melted away just as quickly, and his finger slid in slow and deep. Alistair's breath hissed again, shivering and ending in a little crack of sound, mostly when Taerahel's finger was seated as far inside as it could go. He flexed and moved it there for a moment, letting the sensation become more familiar, not pushing too hard to stimulate what might still be too new and sensitive. He withdrew a moment later, added more oil, and slipped in two this time, the better to spread the slick and to work up toward what came next. His fingers were slender, and the slide remained easy, although he did notice Alistair's pronounced shivering and raggedness of breath as Zevran was kissing and caressing him on his other side.

When Taerahel drew back his fingers this time, Alistair's hips twitched with it, as though resisting the loss. Taerahel smiled, and kissed Alistair's nape again wetly, before craning toward his ear.

"All right?" he murmured, a catch in his breath as his slick fingers wrapped around his own cock and restored it to aching hardness almost at once. "Are you ready?"

"Yes," Alistair's voice hissed back, without hesitation, although he didn't seem to dare to look around. Taerahel's smile broadened, and he left one more kiss behind before passing the oil across to Zevran, and positioning himself to press his cock-head to Alistair's slick and waiting hole.

He went very slowly, lingering, sinking into close tight warmth by unbearable degrees that made his own breath shake. It was slow enough to leave him time to notice every second of Alistair gasping and shuddering and arching against him, and to let him pause every time he felt muscles tightening in the way ahead, until they eased again and he could continue to press. Dimly, as though at some distance, he was aware of Zevran moving around, the wet sounds of him readying himself as well, and the breathless and almost tortured moan that surely signaled his oiled hand on Alistair's cock. But for now Taerahel's attention was only for the lovely hot grip of Alistair's flesh around him, the warmth of his chest and arse pressed tight as at last Taerahel settled all the way inside him.

For a moment he stayed still, in spite of the pull of instinct, breathing hot through his parted lips into the back of Alistair's shoulder. His arm curled around Alistair's hips and lower belly after a moment, and when his hand bumped companionably against Zevran's in its work on Alistair's cock, he paused a moment to idly tease fingertips over the tip protruding from Alistair's foreskin while Zevran gripped his shaft. Alistair made a thick desperate sound, but just as soon they were both moving on again: Taerahel to grip Alistair's hip for leverage as best he could with his slick hand, and Zevran to turn himself over, before drawing Alistair's cock to his own rear and pressing back against it.

Taerahel pressed particularly firm into Alistair as that was happening, doing his best to make a brace of himself for both of them as Zevran moved them together. With Taerahel's cock inside him, his cock sliding into Zevran, Alistair's voice wrenched out of him on a wavering cry that was loud in the quiet of the room, and muscles seemed to twitch all through him as though he had no idea in what direction to move, or how. Taerahel soothed another kiss into his shoulder, and once they had all fit flush together for a moment, he drew back just enough to drag against every nerve at Alistair's rim before pushing deep again, making Alistair heave a whimpering sound again. He braced with one knee and curled the other further forward, pressing it against the backs of Alistair's thighs, encouraging him to tuck up a bit and improve the angle. Alistair moved accordingly with trembling, heady trust, even as he gulped breath and gasped again on some new backward grind of Zevran's.

It was tricky to move in the right way, certainly: to coordinate themselves enough to push against each other and then with each other by turns, rocking Alistair helpless between their bodies like jetsam on a wave. They had all three worked together so smoothly for so long, however, and in far less enjoyable circumstances than these, that it really took very little time to find a balance and a rhythm. Soon it was a true collaboration, with them both easing away on the same breath, and pressing back together with the next, so that Taerahel drove to the deepest point in Alistair just as Zevran drew Alistair to the deepest point in him. There was hardly a second without sound from Alistair by that point, and none of it sounded at all under his control: just a litany of wracked, gaspy, broken groans, and the rare half-whisper of _please_ or _oh_. He shook and strained and arched between them, clutching first backward at Taerahel's hips and then forward at Zevran's, lost and in a delirium of pleasure. The helpless flutter of all the muscles inside him stole Taerahel's breath away from him, and quickly had his head swimming hotly and his motions hard to control, his need building. He had to try to steady his breathing into practiced meditations before long, clinging to the fine thread of his restraint.

He was lucky not to need to cling to it for much longer. The slow, careful roll of their bodies together built in speed as they mastered it, and as Alistair became increasingly helpless not to move his hips into both competing sensations. It wasn't much longer before his breath and noise had begun to go shaky and irregular, all out of his control, and his writhing between them took on a decidedly desperate edge. Made all the more eager by his own need, Taerahel grasped his hip to drive into him ever harder, abandoning much of the slide of outer friction for a singular focus on the deepest point inside. From the way Alistair twitched and shuddered, his breath cracking and whimpering, it was what he needed as much as was Zevran's vigorous grinding back against his hips from the front, and they pinned him between those two pressures: Taerahel's force driving his cock into Zevran, Zevran's driving him back harder on Taerahel's cock.

It was quickly the peak of what Alistair could bear. Within seconds his hips jutted between them, greedy for both of them, his voice breaking out of him on a hoarse ragged shout -- and he strained, arched, contorted in the sheer onslaught of his pleasure, as he came jolting and bucking against Taerahel and into Zevran. His breath seemed locked tight in his chest for a few seconds, too huge to escape him, and then it struggled free on a ragged tumble of fast, overworked, gasping sounds with his last burst of motion before he was spent.

It was _quite_ an event to be pressed right up against, let alone fucking deep inside of, and Taerahel's own breath was reaching a thin and urgent peak through his teeth by the time Alistair began to still. It would have been lovely to just drive to his end right there, but Alistair being new to the experience and their not having discussed his preferences, Taerahel just barely had the presence of mind to make the instant's decision to withdraw. Alistair shuddered with it, hissing in a way that amid his last aftershocks did not sound unpleasant, and Taerahel pressed his open mouth to the sweat-slick of Alistair's back and then nipped restlessly at it, rubbed his cock deliberately up against the round of Alistair's arse as he stroked himself fast and intent. It was only seconds more before he finally let out a shuddery cry of his own, and came in a hot rush that painted over Alistair's skin.

Zevran was easing himself away from Alistair's prick by the time Taerahel had wrung out the last of his peak, and begun to shudder back into full awareness. Taerahel could hear the rustle of his turning himself over again, and was still just starting to catch his breath when he reached with his arm over Alistair's waist to take hold of Alistair's hand -- much as it dwarfed his own in size. All the same, Alistair was pliant in the aftermath of so much overwhelming him, and it was easy enough to draw his larger hand to Zevran's cock, to wrap it around and stroke it together even as Zevran's breath hissed in and shuddered out. It only took a few seconds for Alistair to begin to move his grip on his own, even, if a bit clumsily, and then Taerahel's hand could release his to cup and gently squeeze around Zevran's stones instead, and circle fingertips behind them at the spot that drew out a harder, hungrier gasp.

They worked together like that for a short while, both their hands caressing Zevran together and coaxing him on. Taerahel propped himself up eventually over Alistair's arm, so he could see and reach better past Alistair's body, which paid as well when Alistair finally craned his mouth with charming timidity to Zevran's and was immediately seized in a hungry kiss. Taerahel watched them, with a small heavy-breathed smile, even as his and Alistair's hands picked up speed and Zevran's breath and urgency began to shudder toward his end.

And then with a long, strained, voiced breath out, Zevran's hips jumped and thrusted into their joined hands, and he too spilled his last over Alistair's heavy knuckles as they continued to work over him. Taerahel kept his hand moving along with Alistair's as Zevran gasped through his last throes and then collapsed limp to the bed, and then they were both stilling, letting him go by turns to finally just lie all together in a tangled heap.

Quiet and stillness fell in over the room, without all their noise and motion holding it all at bay. They only remained where they were for a while, the rhythms of their breathing all slightly at odds with each other. Then after a while, Zevran began to stir and make as if to get up again -- causing Alistair to clutch at him with a disgruntled noise that sounded more suited to a drowsing bear than a man.

Taerahel smiled against Alistair's shoulder, and Zevran laughed, leaning back in to kiss Alistair's brow. "Yes, indeed, your Majesty," he said, as though Alistair had made some argument with actual words, "but if we do not take a moment to clean up now, you may have cause to regret it come morning."

That was apparently food enough for thought that it did cause Alistair to release him, albeit reluctantly. Zevran rewarded him with another kiss on his forehead before sliding away, doing them all three the kindness of wetting several cloths at the room's basin, and dousing the few candles that were still casting the bedroom in a dim glow. He returned to the bed with that done, and passed the other rags around before mopping at himself. They cleaned up as best they could in companionable silence, and with cloths tossed aside, settled into the least fouled areas of the bed possible without need for discussion either. There was something to be said for the size of a king's bed, it seemed, and they all fit there together comfortably: Taerahel resting on Alistair's chest in the circle of his arm, Zevran curled alongside him with arm slung around his middle.

The work was done, no threat waited outside, they were sweat-sticky and spent and exhausted, and their three heartbeats braided together in the dark. Sleep came more easily than it had for some time.


	4. Resolution

Taerahel squinted his eyes open against full daylight from an unfamiliar window, and enjoyed the extravagance of taking his time to orient himself in the moment. He was curled on his side in the relative luxury of Alistair's royal bed, the warmth of Alistair's chest pressed close to the front of him. Zevran's arm hung draped over Alistair's waist, hand resting against Taerahel's along Alistair's lower belly, even as the rest of Zevran remained hidden behind. Taerahel gave it a sleepy, fond squeeze, and then looked up to see Alistair's eyes open as well, watching him from where Alistair lay facing him with a smile that was both rueful and warm.

Resettling so he could better meet Alistair's eyes but not move outside the comfort of his presence, Taerahel answered it. "Awake already?" he murmured, leaving Zevran's hand to rest where it lay and instead touching his fingertips to Alistair's chest.

"Barely," Alistair said, with a little breath of a laugh. Taerahel made an amused noise, and traced a small idle pattern on his skin.

"Are you all right?" he asked presently, his tone and gaze a bit more serious as he turned both up toward Alistair. Alistair hesitated a moment, and then huffed another breath of amusement, with an awkward sort of smile.

"Yes. Tired, and sore in -- _completely_ unexpected new ways, but... all right, yeah. Are you?"

Taerahel let his eyes drift half-lidded as his smile broadened. "Mmm. I'm excellent, in fact." Alistair's slight pinkening even as he smiled back at that was enjoyable, and Taerahel took another moment to idly pet his chest while he thought out his next words. "I only... had the sense that you can be something of a romantic, I suppose. And I wondered if it might be a bit of a disappointment for this to be your introduction, rather than with someone truly special."

"If you're implying the two of you aren't anyone special, you're wrong," Alistair said, though -- measured and serious himself, and more readily than Taerahel might have expected. His gaze on Taerahel's was likewise steady, and soft. "I... all right, I'll admit it wasn't exactly what I might have pictured once. But I don't know what's happened to me in the last year that _was_. And that was, ah... well, I can't say I have any complaints." He let out a small embarrassed laugh, with enough of another blush alongside it that Taerahel couldn't help smiling again. "I know we haven't always seen eye to eye on everything, but you and Zevran both are really important to me. I've been depending on you all this time, haven't I? It -- means a lot, that you would want to do this. ...Thank you."

"I think I can speak for both of us that the pleasure was truly ours," Taerahel said, reaching up this time to cup Alistair's cheek with all new warmth in his smile. Alistair couldn't seem to meet that gaze for long, soon turning his head in the guise of pressing a kiss to Taerahel's palm. "We value you too, a great deal, you know. You're a good man, Alistair. Probably better than either of us deserves as a friend, to be honest."

"We'll have to agree to disagree," Alistair said, with a huff of a laugh in Taerahel's palm. He did risk darting his eyes back, amused and hesitating, as he added, "Did you two seriously _talk_ about this, ahead of time?"

"Of course," Taerahel said, shrugging. "We had to be certain we were of one mind, after all -- in the particulars as well as the broad strokes, for that matter." Alistair's expression spoke more plainly than ever of uncertainty how to interpret that, and Taerahel beamed at him, with only a touch of impishness. "And I would say our circumspection worked out rather well for all of us, wouldn't you?"

"Do I have to answer that?" Alistair said, laughing again with it, this time into a hand he'd brought up to rub over his face. Taerahel stroked his cheek again to make him peer out from beneath it, and kissed him, not at great length but with no hurry to be done.

"I think you already have," he said as he withdrew, smirking, and then paused to yawn into his hand. "I... really should get up soon, I have a few matters I want to attend to today. And I'm sure you do as well. After that, though -- would you be so kind as to accompany me back to Fort Drakon?"

Alistair nodded, with a look fast approaching resignation. "Hm. Keeping up our end of the bargain, I assume?"

"Something like that, yes." At Alistair's frown, though, Taerahel only glanced at him, and smiled briefly. "There's... something that's been bothering me."

\---

"Gentlemen," Anora said, rising to meet them as they both crowded back into the tiny cell -- although with a bit more breathing room than before. Taerahel had asked politely that the guards wait outside this time, assuring them that he and Alistair could quite handily protect themselves against a single unarmed woman, and though Alistair's frown at him had carved very deeply indeed, he had backed Taerahel without a single question. It was both humbling to be trusted so well, and at times a most merciful convenience. "It seems that too much time has passed to think that my information was of no use. Am I to assume that Ceorlic has been thwarted, then?"

"Yes, quite handily," Taerahel said, smiling. He stood alongside Alistair as much as he could in the limited space, assuming a posture that suggested the three of them as old friends, exchanging a companionable chat. "You were right that his main advantage was the ability to throw money around. The Red Star arrived in port yesternight with a dozen Antivan Crows hidden in her belly, but I'm pleased to report they were all dead by dawn. And we are most grateful for your counsel, of course."

Anora didn't react to any of that news in any particular way at all, not that Taerahel had really expected her to. Her expression was as politely interested as though Taerahel had been informing her of a delivery of floral arrangements to the palace banquet hall. At his last, however, she did allow herself a fractional, knowing smile. "You have done well yourselves, it seems. And will your gratitude indeed take the material form that we had previously discussed, now that the threat has been dispatched?"

Taerahel's smile broadened -- to the size and brilliance that those who knew him best had learned most specifically not to trust. "We have no intention of reneging on our bargain as negotiated, of course," he said. "Before we discuss that, though, there is one small matter I wanted to address."

Anora's eyebrow rose. "And what would that be?"

Alistair was looking at him as well, and with as little guile to cover his own mystification as ever, but Taerahel could afford that little concern. "This matter came to our attention in the first place because a palace servant was discovered with a vial of poison, of a variety which is particular to the Antivan Crows, " he said, easily and off-handedly. "The poor woman had stolen it from the belongings of a man who had visited the palace in Ceorlic's company, hoping to sell it for a bit of spare coin, but instead had the misfortune to be suspected of attempting to poison the king. This was not at all a convenient occurrence from her perspective, of course, but from ours... For an untrained thief and smuggler to just happen to be clumsily removing such an item from the palace, at such a time that she could be easily caught and the plot discovered? It began to occur to me far later than it should have done that this was very fortunate indeed."

He paused a moment there, although no reply seemed immediately forthcoming from either Anora or Alistair. At last Anora only said, in a very neutral tone of voice. "Quite so. Is there some purpose to this observation?"

Taerahel smiled at her. It was a sort of smile he had found much occasion to practice over his years in the Circle and as a Grey Warden both. "Yes, there is. When I spoke to the serving-girl, you see, she mentioned having been alerted to the presence of valuable goods among the bann's entourage by a palace guardswoman. But once this thought had entered my mind, in retrospect, that fact seemed curious as well. The contents of the Crow's luggage were indeed valuable, but there was nothing so outwardly ostentatious about any of the items the group brought that a guard should have taken notice, just on a glance." He watched Anora's face the whole time he spoke, although as in all of this so far, it never changed expression in the slightest.

"So I investigated the guard roster for the days of the bann's stay. There are only a few women who serve in the palace guard, and only one who was stationed within the palace on the days in question. And when I inquired about her duties in general, I learned that she also has a regular rotation on the upper levels of Fort Drakon, in fact on the door of this very cell." Taerahel's smile spread. "On a bit more investigation, I even discovered she was serving that same duty about three weeks prior to Bann Ceorlic's visit to the palace, when the bann instead made a visit to you, Anora, of which I confess I had not previously been aware. Nor even that he had been in Denerim at all at that time, for that matter. Quite strange to visit twice in such quick succession, with such a distance to travel both ways, don't you agree?"

Anora did not respond for another very long moment. In that time, she only stood, and regarded Taerahel with the flat, composed disinterest of one staring at a cloud, or a wall, or the slow shifting of a shaft of sunlight, while other thoughts occupied the mind. Something was definitely happening on Alistair's face, meanwhile, but Taerahel did not for a second break his gaze from hers to check.

"Clearly you know that I was aware of his plan," Anora said at last, her arms folded and not the slightest inch of ground yet given on her face, "so I confess I see little purpose in batting at me like a cat with a bit of string."

"Just self-indulgence, really," Taerahel admitted, with a touch more honesty in his smile. Anora did not return it, but he fancied her countenance might have become a fraction less stony as well, all the same.

"Now _hold on_ ," Alistair began, in a low and slightly dangerous tone. Taerahel ignored him for now, just keeping Anora's gaze and cutting him off.

"I assume he wanted you to succeed Alistair after his mysterious assassination, as you are still technically his heir as per the arrangements for the Archdemon's attack?" Anora at least deigned to nod, and Taerahel tilted his head. "He must have at least thought you agreed, too, or he wouldn't have gone through with the plan you knew about. But you scuttled it from underneath him. You sent the guard with the tip to expose his Crow. You guided us to the ship. Why?"

"I am certain you don't imagine that Ceorlic's proposal to me was out of the goodness of his heart, nor his genuine desire to see me sit the throne," Anora said, with an unmistakably wry edge. "His stipulation was that I wed his son and thereby make of him Prince-Consort, elevating Ceorlic's family to royal power as well. Even were the bann's son not a brutish fool of a man, I would not have found those terms particularly agreeable." She paused a moment, appearing to consider, and then her expression softened just the slightest bit further still. "Also, although you may find it difficult to believe, I had no wish to see Alistair slain. Little enthusiasm though I may have for his rule, he _is_ the half-brother of my late husband, and in general a good and fair-minded man. I do not think the world would be the better for both sons of Maric being out of it. Make of that what you will."

"Oh, well, thank you so very much," Alistair said, although it came out in a tone a bit more complicated than the sneer he might have been aiming for. Taerahel only nodded, and regained a bit of his smile.

"And out of your touching concern for his welfare, rather than simply alert us of the plot outright, you seized an opportunity to negotiate for terms," he concluded, his tone as pleasant as before. "And to hedge your bets in case Ceorlic's assassins succeeded instead, at the same time, of course. This way, whoever won out, you would be sure to profit by it."

Anora graced him with the smallest of smiles. "I assure you that I had every confidence in your capabilities."

"Naturally," Taerahel said, answering it.

After regarding him coolly for another moment, Anora sighed slightly, and let her posture ease again somewhat. "I take it, however, that as I did negotiate our bargain under false pretenses, you do not consider yourselves obligated to honor its terms?"

Taerahel shrugged. "I didn't say that."

"You -- what?" This from Alistair, of course, and when Taerahel glanced at him he found Alistair had jerked his head round with a disbelieving stare. "Are you out of your _mind_? On top of everything else, you work out she's been playing both sides against the middle from the start, and your conclusion is 'oh, well, ta then, off you go just like we said'?"

"I didn't say that either," Taerahel said, with a slight smile that Alistair's expression plainly told him must have been quite maddening.

"Then what?" Alistair demanded, throwing an arm out to one side. "You convinced me before, but it has to be obvious now we can't just exile her and be done with it. We march her into Orlais and in a year she'll -- be back with an army of chevaliers, somehow."

"I do not appreciate that particular implication," Anora said, with an unmistakable chill on her voice. This time it was her Taerahel ignored for the time being.

"No, I agree with you there. It was a hasty decision, made under duress. I've had some time to reconsider." Taerahel did look back at Anora then, and met her eyes. "Have you ever been to Amaranthine?"

Anora frowned, seeming quite understandably thrown by the question. "I have not... been to the city proper, but yes, I have visited the arling a time or two, traveling with my father. Mostly when I was very young. Why?"

Taerahel smiled, with no edges on it this time. "It's come to my attention," he said, slow enough to choose his words carefully, "that there are factions among the nobility in the arling who retained a degree of loyalty to Arl Howe, and who are not best pleased either by the bestowment of Vigil's Keep upon the Wardens, or by the import of Orlesian Wardens to the fortress. As of yet, this has not become a crisis for the beginning of operations in the area, but I think it has the potential to do so." Anora was still only looking at him frowning when he paused, and he went on. "What I propose is this: that you are escorted with a detachment of guards loyal to you -- as the guardswoman who carried messages for you must be, for example -- to a secluded but secure location in the countryside of Amaranthine, there to reside as a free woman. And in exchange, from that position, you make it plain to the conspirators that his Majesty's soft heart and head have led him to release you --"

"I beg your pardon."

"-- but you are now bent on plotting your revenge on him and the Order both, and would be a valuable addition to their forming rebellion," Taerahel finished smoothly, over Alistair's intrusion. "And then, once they have welcomed you into their confidence, you sow sufficient false information, discord, and confusion as to help take the uprising apart before it has scarcely begun."

There was a moment's silence after that, as its impact landed with both Anora and Alistair. Anora only kept watching Taerahel's face as she no doubt considered, however, and her expression still betrayed nothing of her thoughts.

"What gives you such confidence that they will welcome me?" she asked, finally. Taerahel shrugged.

"They might not, of course, and you could hardly be blamed for that. But I think it's more likely they will. Given your father's relationship to Howe, your status, and your obvious reasons to resent the Grey Wardens? They'd be fools not to see you as Maker-sent."

Anora looked less fully convinced, but she did only consider again for a moment. At last, her eyes locked back on Taerahel's -- and with a greater intensity than at any point before.

"And what makes you believe that, once I am a free woman in Amaranthine," she said quietly, "I will abide by the terms of your proposal? Rather than escape to the sort of mischief Alistair imagines of me -- or join with the local nobility to seek revenge in earnest?"

Taerahel gave that a moment's respectful pause, and for a wonder even Alistair didn't interject. Then he offered half a smile, soft and genuine this time. "My knowledge of your intelligence and good sense," he said, simply. "I trust you to recognize that there would be no profit in grudge-holding beyond the meanest satisfaction, especially when the alternative is such an easy means of being shut of all this and free."

Anora's gaze chilled more deeply than ever at that, though, her jaw setting. "'Grudge-holding,'" she repeated softly, sounding as though the word tasted sour on her tongue. "You murdered my father in front of me, and you speak to me of grudge-holding."

Alistair began to gather angry breath to speak, of course, but Taerahel put a gentle repressing hand on his arm and squeezed. It took Alistair a definite moment's struggle to let it go and fall silent, but eventually he did. And all the while, Taerahel still never turned his eyes from the piercing of Anora's.

"Did you know that I was born in Denerim's alienage?" he asked, not quite lightly and conversationally, after a moment's long heavy pause. This time Anora's expression did betray a second of baffled indignation, but he continued before she had time to say anything about it. "It's true. My mother continued to live there until she died, some years after I was given to the templars. If I have a home outside the Circle, I suppose that would be where it is, although I was so young when I left that I scarcely even remembered it on my return." He paused, letting the silence spin out a ways. "When I returned, you'll remember it was to find it being plumbed by Tevinter slavers, and Loghain complicit in their work. You helped me uncover as much yourself. On our visit to my birthplace, my companions must have helped me free as many as fifty of my erstwhile neighbors from barred cages like animals', into which they had been packed so tightly that there was no room to do anything but stand. Others, however, we were too late to help, and they had already been shipped overseas to die in bondage for another's profit -- if they survived the journey. And of course still others had resisted capture, and they were not so fortunate. In one room of the warehouse that served as a base of operations, we found a pile of --"

"Stop," Anora said, quietly, but in a burst from tight lips. She had squeezed her eyes shut and did not open them, and for the first time her voice was slightly unsteady. "Please. Enough."

Taerahel waited a moment in silence, giving her a beat to collect herself. When he finally spoke again, his tone was less neutral, but not unkind.

"There was a time when I wanted revenge on your father, for what I saw as his betrayal," he said. "I won't deny that. There was a time when _betrayal_ , and having been wronged and deceived, seemed like a matter more important to me than any other. But, to no one's greater surprise than my own, that time passed." He looked at Anora steadily even as she did not look back at him, opening her eyes only to cast them down. "I did not 'murder' your father, for my personal satisfaction. I carried out the judgment of the Landsmeet upon his actions: a judgment, I remind you, that he himself did not dispute. That you, yourself, did not even seem to dispute, until it at last came clear to you that it could only end in his death."

He waited, but Anora did not respond to that in any way at all. Still, it seemed worthwhile to give her the time.

"So likewise, there was once a time when it would have troubled me very much to think that you might not keep to the terms of this arrangement," Taerahel said finally, and shrugged. "But it's gone as well, and good riddance, I think. I believe this to be the best solution for all concerned, and should we all agree on that, you will go to Amaranthine, and there you will do whatever you see fit to do, I'm sure." Now Anora did meet his eyes, and he smiled at her gaze, with knowing and with genuine amusement both. "And when I join you there shortly as Warden-Commander at Vigil's Keep, I will be extremely interested to find out what it is that you've decided."

There was another long, thoughtful pause, in which a great deal seemed to be going on in the minds of everyone present even as no one spoke it aloud. Finally, Alistair was the one to break it, with a heavy sigh. "I'm not going to convince you otherwise, am I?" he asked. Rhetorically, Taerahel assumed, though he smiled and shook his head anyway. Alistair rolled his eyes, but he didn't look too terribly upset, at least. "Well... it'll be your own problem, from the sound of it, and not mine. At least not to start. So -- do what you like, I suppose."

"Thank you, Alistair," Taerahel said, and meant it, although he imagined he deserved the snort that was Alistair's only answer.

Anora's expression was set and neutral again when he glanced at her inquiringly, and she regarded both of them for a long moment. "In that case, it would scarcely be in my best interest to refuse," she said at last. Her eyes lingered on Taerahel for a long while, though, before she added as though off-handedly: "I do hope the reasonable success of Alistair's reign can survive your departure, however, Warden Surana. It seems more evident to me than ever that he has not gone unassisted."

"He hasn't," Taerahel said, with a smile that was a touch closer to that first very bright and broad one he'd worn. "But even so, I think you may find that you underestimate him. It's very easy to do."

\---

They parted ways at the gates, Alistair to set off grumbling with his guards to make the arrangements for Anora's release, and Taerahel to return to his and Zevran's rooms. He'd seen little of Zevran since they'd departed Alistair's bed that morning -- too busy with his own various preparatory tasks and investigations -- and by now the afternoon was waning, the city beginning to dim and its streets to be stained with sunset hues.

And he couldn't have said he was surprised, precisely, when he let himself into the sitting room and found Zevran sitting dressed for travel in an armchair, a meager packed bag at his feet. Nor by the way Zevran turned to look at him when he entered: with a warm smile that did not hide his sorrow or nerves or deep braced resignation very well. Unhappy, yes -- his stomach knotting up and sinking miserably inside him, a pang like a cramping muscle spreading all through his chest -- but not, precisely, surprised. None of the finer points had ever really been lost on him.

"Are you leaving already?" he asked softly as he still stood by the door, although he manufactured something of a smile. "I had hoped you might put it off a few days, at least."

Zevran's eyes didn't quite rise to the level of his own, although he also maintained his smile. If he was surprised by Taerahel's lack of surprise, he had the skill not to show it. "I have never much cared for drawing out farewells." His eyes did dart to Taerahel's now, as Taerahel closed the few steps between them, although his gaze winced away again even as he huffed a laugh. "I would almost have preferred to have gone before you returned, with a note to make my apologies -- were it not that I am genuinely terrified of incurring your wrath."

"As well you should be," Taerahel agreed, touched with the haughtiness he was meant to show and did not at all, in this moment, feel. It warmed Zevran's eyes into true amusement, though, and he let it sit a moment before giving it up on a soft exhale. "The proximity of the Crows has been preying on you, I assume."

Zevran nodded, his smile fading at last. "It was only the purest chance that none were able to carry back word of my survival," he said, and then paused for a measured breath. "In point of fact, it is not yet even certain that none _were_. Other spies and operatives may have been at work on this contract in the city, whom we overlooked. I may already be compromised." He looked back again at Taerahel, straight on this time, with a tired and uneven smile. "I suppose it was never a ruse that would last forever. The Crows do frequent Denerim as well: you will recall Ignacio, although you were so prudent as to slay him on completion of his errands."

Taerahel sniffed. "It wasn't prudence. No one talks to you like that in front of me."

That won a warmer, truer laugh out of Zevran, and he pushed to his feet at last to set his hands at Taerahel's waist, leaning their foreheads together. "Such a sweet, vicious creature to have been blessed with," he murmured, and brushed his lips over Taerahel's temple. Taerahel pressed close to him, breathing him in: leather and blood and some faint spice that somehow brought to mind the sea, all so familiar it ached. "Please believe me that I would never leave you without need."

"What are you planning to do?" Taerahel asked, almost into the side of Zevran's jaw, his eyes shut tight. Zevran stroked warm hands over his back.

"Make myself known," he said, his voice low for its nearness to Taerahel's ear. "Draw out those in the Crows who would dearly like to punish me for my transgressions, and kill them. Then, when others come to avenge them, kill those as well. And so on, until the powers that be decide that they can no longer tolerate such losses in the ranks for so little profit, and see fit to negotiate a truce."

Taerahel's brow creased, and he drew back a bit with his arms on Zevran's shoulders to look into his eyes. "Will that work?"

"I have not the slightest idea," Zevran said, with a good cheer that didn't even seem entirely false, for all that Taerahel did not feel it was appropriate. "But my alternatives are in short supply, I fear."

Taerahel hesitated, and then ducked his head, his hands tightening on Zevran. "You could just leave it be. Come with me to Amaranthine. We'll deal with what comes when it comes. Like we always have."

But Zevran shook his head, close enough for Taerahel to feel the stirring of his hair. His smile was gone again, his eyes soft and serious on Taerahel's. "I could accept, if the danger were only to myself. But I will not continue to lure my own past into your path. Especially not after so close a brush as was this one." When Taerahel began to protest, Zevran touched his lips, then kissed them to still them. "And fending off vengeful Crows seems like a very much unneeded distraction for the new Warden-Commander of Ferelden."

Of course he'd known that Taerahel would give in eventually; that much didn't even seem worthy of discussion. Taerahel sighed, and kissed Zevran's hand while it was still close by. "I'm willing to be distracted."

"But not I to place you in harm's way," Zevran said close to his cheek, holding him close again, his tone firm though not unkind. Of course he was never going to be persuaded from his decision, either; but Taerahel couldn't have done anything but try. "When I can be more sure that I will not... then I will return to you. But only then."

Taerahel squeezed his arms tighter around Zevran's shoulders, burying his face a moment in Zevran's neck. Finally, though, he gathered his breath and drew back again, and leaned back in the looser circle of Zevran's arms, looking straight and solemn into his eyes. "Promise. Promise me you will come back, alive."

Zevran's breath caught up short, and after a moment his eyes dropped. "I... cannot. Not with certainty."

"I don't need certainty, I need you to _promise_ ," Taerahel said, with force behind it, and tipped Zevran's chin back up with his fingers to meet his gaze wide-eyed. "Do you remember what I said, the first time you tried to give me this?" He touched the small gold curve of the earring he now wore always, and managed to find in himself at least a tiny smile. "No half measures. Let it be a promise, or give me nothing; but I won't accept anything in between." He hesitated a moment, and then gripped Zevran a little tighter. "And I want you to promise me that you'll come back, so that even if you don't... I'll know you meant to."

"I will always mean to," Zevran said, and there was a raw softness in his gaze that Taerahel could barely stand to look at for long. And then Zevran kissed him, and for a moment, that was all there was or needed to be.

When at last they eased apart, Taerahel let out an unsteady sigh, and pushed himself as close as he could to Zevran, burrowing into his neck and shoulder again. "I love you so much," he said, half-muffled, clinging tight. "I'm going to miss you every second, and I don't even care if you're smug about it."

He could feel Zevran's smile, pressing to his temple; but when Zevran spoke, his voice was just as low and sincere as before. "I love you, Taerahel. More than I ever imagined of myself. More than my life."

It took a moment for Taerahel to pull himself together from that, and he swiped at his eyes even as he turned his head to be heard a bit better. "Well, try to love your life a little better for the time being, and bring it back to me," he said, trying for dry reproach even as his voice wavered under him. He succeeded at least enough to make Zevran breathe a laugh into his skin. After a moment's pause, he added, not without a touch of resignation: "You know where you'll find me."

"I always have," Zevran murmured; and turned a smile that must have been insufferably self-satisifed inward for one last, lingering kiss.

\---

"You don't actually have to do this, you know," Alistair said, hovering as Taerahel knelt in the sitting-room, checking the fittings of his pack. Much of the personality and lived-in look had been leached out of these rooms by this point; Zevran had left over a week ago, and Taerahel had been at work for all the time since, packing what he needed and putting aside what he didn't.

He glanced up at Alistair now, smiling a bit, pushing stray hair from his eyes. "I can't put it off forever."

"You could, though." Taerahel sat back on his ankles to look at Alistair more directly, amused, and Alistair shrugged with a little smile of his own. "All right, maybe not if you stay here, but you could go somewhere else. Disappear into the wilderness. If high command asked, I'd just say very honestly that I had no idea where you'd gone."

That actually got a laugh out of Taerahel, even as he climbed to his feet. "I appreciate the offer," he said. "But... it's all right. I've already made up my mind." He only met Alistair's eyes for a moment, and then added with a twist in his lips, "And if nothing else, it should be interesting for them to discover just how terrible a mistake it was to put me in command."

"Some mistakes are worth making, I seem to recall someone telling me," Alistair said, grinning, and Taerahel couldn't help laughing a little in spite of all efforts. "Also, you do realize you've been in command before, right? And I think it's fair to say you did very well at it."

"Hmm." Taerahel gave that a moment's consideration. "I suppose, though I don't think I've ever really thought of it that way. We just all worked together." Alistair didn't bother arguing with that, though, and Taerahel picked up his pack-strap to give it another testing tug. "Well, we'll see. I do have to admit, there's a part of me that is a bit excited to be in the field again. Killing things, and encountering terrible people, and killing them too, and all that."

"Saving villages, protecting the helpless, driving back the forces of evil..." Alistair counted off on his fingers, smirking, and then laughed when Taerahel rolled his eyes extravagantly with a gusty sigh. "You can't fool me, you know. I know all your secrets." Taerahel gave him an unmeant sour look this time, and Alistair met it with only a smile -- one that was now more genuine and gentle than he might have expected. "You're a good Warden and a decent person, and you're going to do good work. Much better than you seem to think."

After only a brief struggle, Taerahel let the warm smile be pulled out of him that wanted to, as he straightened up and faced Alistair again. "I'm going to miss you," he said after a moment's pause, with a sincerity that made Alistair's gaze falter away from his now. "I am sorry that we've both had to leave you; I wish we didn't. Even if I do think with Ceorlic properly made example of, you're likely to be quite a bit safer for a while."

"It's all right." Alistair caught his eye again, smiling, and it was real enough that it could ease him at least a little bit. "It was good having you here. But this is important. And you won't be _so_ far away."

"No, I won't," Taerahel agreed, and stepped in a bit closer, to set his hands in a familiar sort of way on Alistair's shoulders -- to his apparent slight startlement. "Just promise me one thing? Look after yourself -- even without us here to help. Even stuck with all this in spite of yourself, I know you still care too much for your own good, and I worry." Alistair still looked far too thrown to say anything, uneasy and a bit incredulous and wrong-footed, and Taerahel smiled and smoothed both hands over his shoulders. "I'm glad you do, too, of course. All I ask is that you take some time to be selfish and irresponsible, now and again." He craned up almost on his toes a moment, head tipped up, lips closer to Alistair's. "And if you need some help with that.... we'll be around."

And then he had closed the distance, and caught Alistair's mouth in a kiss: light and mostly closed, but not by any means chaste.

Alistair was quite pink about the face by the time he had drawn away again, Taerahel noted with some amusement, and he moved back and away to set about taking up his pack and staff, giving Alistair a moment to sort himself out. It seemed to help, and after a few seconds he cleared his throat, and tugged a bit at his clothing to set it to rights. "Yes. Well, ah... I'll keep that in mind." Taerahel turned to smile at him, as he was getting himself situated, and Alistair reached to help unthinkingly with one of the straps before seeming satisfied. "Are you ready? The recruit who's escorting you -- ah, Mhairi, I think -- she's waiting at the gate, whenever you are."

"Yes, I think so." Taerahel paused a moment, though, and he cast one last glance around the room. But it didn't tell him much at this point, to be honest: it was just another place along the road where he had paused for a while, and spent some time. But it had been good, being here, all the same. He just had to believe there would be other places that were as good again. As he had first really realized only when Duncan had led him to the bridge into Ostagar, and he had been frozen for a moment with his breath caught in his chest looking out over the wilds... the world was a very large place. Every time he thought he knew how large, he learned one more time that there was more that he had never even suspected.

"Well then," Taerahel said, and cast Alistair one more smile as he stepped back, and stepped toward the door. "Let's get on with it."

**Author's Note:**

> Title from the song "Surrender" by The Antlers.
> 
> Bann Ceorlic probably doesn't deserve the way he's been depicted in this story, but on the other hand, I don't care. Screw you, guy!
> 
> And with that, this series is done! Thank you so much if you've been reading! Check out [the Spotify playlist for the whole series](https://open.spotify.com/playlist/23DVmlgkEDaYD6wRU58Hgd?si=ov15-eAlRESX7an_UBlmeA), if you want!


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